That aspect of the story, coming at the end of the investigation felt realistic, and was carefully handled to suit the age of the potential readership, without coming across as gawky or silly.Īll of this personal angst, however, doesn't detract from the investigation and whilst Mycroft's obsession with forensics did, perhaps, bring up a few unexpected investigative elements, not enough to make you wonder how or why. Mycroft, in the role of eccentric genius, also has demons of his own, and his oddness is never a barrier to friendship and, as the book ends, a little in the way of romantic attraction. Watts being a reluctant city dweller due to family circumstances, it was nice to see a country person who longs to return for the right reasons. Alongside the investigation enough time is devoted to drawing out each protagonist's problems. They are both, for their own reasons, slightly outsiders, although they have a strong core group of a few good friends, and at least for Watts, family support.īecause of their differences, their friendship makes sense and provides a chance for the author to show the power of acceptance. Watts is a country girl brought to the city by the problems of family farming in drought, and Mycroft is English, and a city boy, in Australia as a result of the catastrophic death of his family. The obvious conflict of a boy and a girl as partners in detecting, is further enhanced by both of these characters being different from each other, and different from everybody else. (Harking back to the panel mentioned above, it seems that there is a very large adult readership of YA fiction now). It's fiction written for readers around the same age as the two central characters, but it's also very accessible for adults. Rachel Watts and James Mycroft (with an obvious hat tip to Sherlock Holmes going on). After all, a lot of firmly welded on crime fiction readers would have progressed straight from the likes of Trixie Belden, Famous Five and the Hitchcock mysteries straight to Agatha Christie, Ngaio Marsh and the like (allowing for the age category into which the reader falls obviously).ĮVERY BREATH is crime fiction based around two teenage protagonists.

It came as a mild surprise that this is now a special category, but it is particularly pleasing to know there are some YA Crime Fiction books popping up. At the recent Ballarat Writers / Sisters in Crime collaboration, DEATH IN JULY, one of the panels was on YA writing and books.

Every breath by ellie marney