by Patrice Lawrence
 
A mystery told in three unforgettable voices. 
 
Sen: a spiky rebel, soon to become a muse who walks like a queen. Sen has been living for the last year with young mum, Ari, in the home of a Banksy-styled, pink-haired, punk artist who goes by the name of Vixen. Her real identity is a mystery. The deal is, Ari keeps house -and both her and Sen stay schtum- in exchange for board. 
Aryton: a loner (not by choice), struggling to thrive under the over-protective grip of his traumatised parent. Aryton and his Mum have just moved back to their home town of Luxworth, which means starting Year 8 in a new school and a return to the place where all their hauntings began. This is where, for a few hours, as a tiny baby, Aryton was taken away in his pram by a stranger. 
Stanley: a questioning teen who can never scrub up to resemble his twin, who stores up clever words to impress his aunties. In any case, these days, Stanley is overboard-distracted. He’s on a mission to uncover the whereabouts of the Forbidden Grandma. But his family keep cautioning him to stay well away. None of them are keen to reconnect with the family member who stole a baby… 
 
This is Patrice Lawrence’s first middle grade mystery and we hope there will be so many more to come. The genre is a natural ‘home’ for Lawrence, exploiting everything she does best. All of her YA and MG canon is built on intricately-constructed plots which beguile with clues and equivocations, building to explosive discoveries. And, always, the detection is led by the most luxuriously fleshed out young characters, developed with exceptional care, lending them a deeply-felt authenticity. The worlds she build, whether in fantasy or here, in realism, feel like second homes within pages. Her characters enchant and pulse, perhaps especially the young people who are labelled ‘difficult’ by many of the adults around them. Curtailed and policed by myriad institutions, these young characters end up storming in to the core of their worlds, taking up space and grabbing their full, righteous, agency. Sen, in People Like Stars, is no exception. Her journey is thrilling to witness and the narrative arc which draws these three voices together will stitch itself right in to you. Age 9-12, Paperback 292pp
 
Themes: Diverse Families