Crater Lake

Lance does not want the truth about what he did to Trent to become known. He was only protecting Chet. That’s what he does. Lance does not worry about the constant threats from the click-clacking heeled Miss Hoche. However, as he and his Montmorency Year 6 classmates begin their school journey at ‘Crater Lake’, there are fresh worries. Furthermore, these worries grow to become a fight for survival.

Why is Digger the only apparent centre staff member? The group knows it is the first school to attend this activity centre, but it’s more than underprepared. Soup? One channel on television? No air conditioning or open windows, and instructions that the children must not go outside? On the first night at the centre things take a strange turn. Lance’s suspicions are already on red alert, so he’s quick to take the lead to work out what’s going on. What he discovers goes against all sense, any known entity, into the worlds of horror and fantasy…

Can Lance’s initiative, years of playing strategy games, and general sense of survival, win against an attack drill? Will his friends and classmates realise the true competence of somebody marginalised as the class clown, destined to fail?

Jennifer Killick has created something truly special in ‘Crater Lake’. This writer draws us into the drama immediately so that we realise the dynamics of Lance’s class, alongside his instincts and fears. We trust him implicitly. It’s rare for a writer to create such realistic characters and interaction; there is no space-filling but direct action and connection. This is despite such an inescapable, predatory, situation!

From the superb, ‘Mo, Lottie and the Junkers‘ and the ‘Alex Sparrow’ series, Jennifer Killick has spun a yellow-jacketed nest of thrills in ‘Crater Lake‘. Bookwagon is honoured to recommend and sell this brilliant title!