ACHUKA Children's Books UK

children's & YA recommendations on the go

You are here: Home / Archives for thriller

Last One To Die by Cynthia Murphy

By Leave a Comment

ACHUKA Book of the Day 6 Jan 2021

Waterstones
Amazon
Bookshop

Are you a teen who thrills to be terrified? This book is for you.
Promoted as “Point Horror for the social media generation” [The book is published by Scholastic]
We love the striking jacket design.

Young, brunette women are being attacked in London. 16-year-old, Irish-born Niamh has just arrived for a summer of freedom, and quickly discovers that the girls being attacked look frighteningly similar to her. Niamh is determined not to let her fear destroy her summer. But can her new friends be trusted? Will she be able to stay ahead of the attacker? Or will she be next? Packed with voice-driven whodunit storytelling, and a retro slasher-movie feel reminiscent of cult classics, this dark, pacy, and irresistibly-creepy debut really has something for everybody!

Last One to Die is a YA horror novel and you’ve mentioned that Point Horror has been a big influence for you. Can you tell us a bit more about your debut, and the inspiration behind it?

Last One to Die came about after a huge writing slump. I was actually trying to write something else when I started listening to a podcast called Lore and an episode about a creepy Victorian villain, Spring Heeled Jack. I had never heard of him, but it planted a little seed which I kept coming back to. I shelved what I was writing and started to brainstorm a teen horror. I have always been a huge fan of anything remotely scary so went and re-watched all of the classics from my teens – Scream, Final Destination, The Craft – and I knew that I wanted to write something scary but also fun. I wanted to recapture that feeling I had as a teen where I was thrilled to be terrified!

from Curtis Brown’s website

 

Burn Our Bodies Down by Rory Power

By Leave a Comment

Waterstones
Amazon
Bookshop

A blistering horror-thriller  that will grip you from its very first page.

From the author of the New York Times bestselling Wilder Girls comes a twisty thriller about a girl whose past has always been a mystery – until she decides to return to her mother’s hometown, where history has a tendency to repeat itself . . .

Ever since Margot was born, it’s been just her and her mother. No answers to Margot’s questions. No history to hold on to. Just the two of them, stuck in their run-down apartment, struggling to get along. But that’s not enough for Margot. She wants family. She wants a past. And when she finds a photograph pointing her to a town called Phalene, she leaves. But when Margot gets there, it’s not what she bargained for. Margot’s mother left for a reason. But was it to hide her past? Or was it to protect Margot from what’s still there?


 

The Cousins by Karen M. McManus

By Leave a Comment

ACHUKA Book of the Day 10 Dec 2020
Times Children’s Book of the Week 5 Dec 2020

“In classic McManus fashion, perspectives shift, providing insights into the three cousins’ distinct stories and personal motives while maintaining a steady pace that leaves readers flipping pages. Every twist is gasp-inducing, and the ending will satisfy some and make others yearn for a sequel.” KIRKUS

A brilliant new thriller from the author of One Of Us Is Lying and One Of Us Is Next.

The Storys are the envy of their neighbours: owners of the largest property on their East Coast island, they are rich, beautiful, and close. Until it all falls apart. The four children are suddenly dropped by their mother with a single sentence: You know what you did.

They never hear from her again. Years later, when 18-year-old cousins Aubrey, Milly and Jonah Story receive a mysterious invitation to spend the summer at their grandmother’s resort, they have no choice but to follow their curiosity and meet the woman who’s been such an enigma their entire lives.

This entire family is built on secrets, right? It’s the Story legacy. This summer, the teenagers are determined to discover the truth at the heart of their family. But some secrets are better left alone.

Waterstones
Bookshop
Amazon

The Rules by Tracy Darnton

By Leave a Comment

ACHUKA Book of the Day 16 Oct 2020

”A heart-thuddingly nervy thriller’ — Financial Times

A gripping thriller from Waterstones Children’s Book Prize-Shortlisted Tracy Darnton, author of The Truth About Lies.

Amber’s an expert when it comes to staying hidden – she’s been trained her whole life for it. But what happens when the person you’re hiding from taught you everything you know?

When a letter from her dad arrives, Amber knows she’s got to move – and fast. He’s managed to find her and she knows he’ll stop at nothing to draw her back into the extreme survivalist way of life he believes in.

All of a sudden the Rules she’s spent so long trying to escape are the ones keeping her safe. But for how long?

Waterstones
Amazon

The Haunting Of Aveline Jones by Phil Hickes ill. Keith Robinson

By Leave a Comment

ACHUKA Book of the Day 16 Sep 2020

A spooky mystery from a debut author, and the first book in a  new adventure series.

Aveline Jones loves reading ghost stories, so a dreary half-term becomes much more exciting when she discovers a spooky old book. Not only are the stories spine-tingling, but it once belonged to Primrose Penberthy, who vanished mysteriously, never to be seen again. Intrigued, Aveline decides to investigate Primrose’s disappearance. Now someone…or something, is stirring. And it is looking for Aveline. Turn on your torches, and join Aveline Jones in her first charmingly spooky mystery, from debut author Phil Hickes.

The book has a stand-out cover by Keith Robinson
Follow the illustrator on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/keithrobinson_illustration/

Waterstones
Amazon

Devil Darling Spy by Matt Killeen

By Leave a Comment

ACHUKA Book of the Day Wed 11 Mar 2020

A sequel to Matt Killeen’s debut espionage thriller, Orphan Monster Spy, which was shortlisted for both the Branford Boase Award and the Costa Children’s Book Award, whose judges summarised the book as “A compelling, darkly thrilling debut – tense, cinematic and brilliant.”

Sarah is used to spying in the champagne-fuelled parties of Nazi Berlin. But her new mission is infinitely more deadly – tracking a deadly virus across bullet-torn Africa, to uncover the monster who would use it to create fifty million corpses. Her enemies think she is a terrified little girl. But she is a warrior set to burn them all.

Waterstones

It Ends With You by S. K. Wright

By Leave a Comment

Everyone loves Eva. Beautiful, bright, fun, generous – she’s perfect. So when her body is found in a ditch in the local woods the only thing anyone wants to know is: Who could have done this?

It has to be Luke, her boyfriend. He has the motive, the means, the opportunity and he’s no stranger to the police. Even though the picture is incomplete, the pieces fit. But as time passes, stories change.

It Ends With You is clever and compulsive. It challenges preconceptions, makes you second-guess yourself with each chapter, and it holds an uncomfortable mirror up to the way societies and systems treat outsiders.

“The social commentary, though on point, never overwhelms the engaging, page-turning plot.” Irish Times

Waterstones

The Wren Hunt by Mary Watson

By Leave a Comment

“Variously described as folklore, fantasy and mystery, The Wren Hunt wears its labels lightly, shedding one genre for another with a sort of slippery grace that initially confuses. But the story takes flight once Wren is ensconced in the judges’ territory, and the book settles into a deft equilibrium between thriller and myth. Watson’s writing has the sort of poise rarely found in a debut, moving the plot at a steady pace, shot through with moments of true beauty.” Kiran Millwood Hargrave, GUARDIAN Review

Waterstones