I loved the scenes of Donny and Zoe escaping down the canal – it was especially engaging for me, as I lived in Herfordshire briefly, and I can picture that stretch of the canal so vividly. Yet there are moments of humour too, as Donny and his new friends navigate countless dangers in an attempt to build a brighter future. My debut novel, 29 Locks, was shortlisted for both the Lucy Cavendish Fiction Prize and Mslexia Children’s Novel Competition and was longlisted in the Berkshire Book Award 2022. However, I liked Donny and rooted for him, and would've liked to have seen more depth to his character development. A fast-paced, tender and unflinching depiction of teenage friendship and resilience against the odds.

To survive, he must rely on the help of unaccompanied teenage refugees, living rough in the dunes east of Calais. August 2020 Reading: Small Pleasures; Echo Hall; The Vanishing Half; A Different Drummer; The Naseby Horses; For When I’m Gone; Inside The Beautiful Inside; Long Live the Post Horn! These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc. Hotjar sets this cookie to know whether a user is included in the data sampling defined by the site's pageview limit. Donny's fate as I say, seems sealed and he's to be either an addict or responsible for others no matter what he does.

When Donny’s posh new friend Zoe is offered a dubious modelling audition in London, the pair decide to ‘borrow’ a canal barge and navigate the 29 locks down to Kings Cross. It's a very dark insight into a world that we all know exist, but often pretend not to see and for Donny it's a world he can't completely escape from even if he wants too, with a Mum whose addiction holds her hostage and caused him to be torn away from all he knows.

I loved the scenes of Donny and Zoe escaping down the canal – it was especially engaging for me, as I lived in Hertfordshire briefly, and I can picture that stretch of the canal so vividly. Donny has enough experience to know that something isn’t right and he will do whatever he has to to keep Zoe safe. And it just works so, so well, raising so many ideas and issues in a provoking way that forces the reader to reconsider perspectives and challenges them to think differently. Heartbreaking but ultimately hopeful, the exhilarating plot and memorable characters combine to create a true page-turner.Fifteen-year-old Donald Leroy Samson is the son of an absentee St Lucian father and a drug-addicted English mother. I am a child of a underprivileged family and could empathise with Donny on some levels and Nicola Garrard has excellently portrayed this in 29 Locks.