A fine, emotionally engaging YA fantasy adventure featuring romance, gang warfare, humour and a rich cast of characters who engage in exciting set-piece chases and fights. There are touching scenes of young love. A music soundtrack is referenced throughout. The dialogue is pacy and contemporary. Spex, the 17 year-old narrator, frequently interjects face-to-camera type commentary/asides.
The debut author is a young Malawi in his twenties who has lived in the UK since the age of 3. He has always loved writing and drawing, and says that most of his early influences came from cartoons and anime. His main goal is to write an animated TV show, and embarked on writing this novel as a way of testing his writing ability.
Inspirations for Voodooville include Murukami’s Kafka On The Shore, the Scott Pilgrim graphic novels, the Japanese animation of Howl’s Moving Castle, City of God, Fooly Cooly (FLCL) and the 2015 film Brick. Readers of the book will find traces of all these in the story.
