Fabulous reads – Promising novel fails to deliver

Nevertell, Katharine Orton, Pan Macmillan, ISBN: 9781406385182

THEY say never judge a book by its cover but I did. The illustration on Katherine Orton’s YA novel, Nevertell, is beautiful and it is what initially drew me to the book.

Then followed an intriguing synopsis that promised magic and fantasy, however, I felt let down. By the end of the novel I wasn’t fully captivated by the story.

Don’t get me wrong, the book is not by any means poorly written and there are times where historical fiction and Russian (the book is set in Siberia) fairytales merge together to marry an interesting storyline. There’s a part of me wishing the author could’ve gotten to the point sooner.

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The book follows Lina, who is born in a Soviet prison camp and has never known anything else. Then, one night, she escapes with her best friend, Bogdan, to try and journey to Moscow to find her long-lost grandmother.

We follow the pair across a snowy wilderness as they are pursued by a seemingly vengeful sorceress and her pack of shadow wolves. There are a few twists and turns with any YA fantasy, but it was not enough for me as this icy adventure fizzles out.

The positives I can give the author is that she makes the world of Soviet-era gulags palatable for younger readers. The pacing of the book is great and the characters are generally well rounded and sometimes it feels like you are transported into a Narnia-esque fairytale but ultimately it wasn’t my favourite.