She has taken us on adventures across the Parisian rooftops (Rooftoppers), to the Russian woods (The Wolf Wilder) and through the Amazon jungle (The Explorer), and now Katherine Rundell invites us into the speakeasies of mafia-ridden, Prohibition-era New York City. As always with the award-winning writer, who, at the age of 32, is fast becoming one of our greatest living children’s authors, it is beautifully written, and it is her plottiest story yet...With its rollicking crime plot, this is perhaps the most accessible of Rundell’s novels so far — and if you have yet to discover her, it’s a good place to start. It’s likely to be the best children’s book you’ll read this year.
Katherine Rundell, whose fourth children’s novel, The Explorer, won the Costa children’s book award last year, knows how to construct a captivating narrative and turn a surprising sentence. Not only is her latest an irresistible journey, but every inch of it is a delight.
Katherine Rundell’s latest novel, The Good Thieves, tells the story of another family torn apart and seeking to bring itself back together. Vita is an appropriately lively heroine, with hair ‘the reddish-brown of a freshly washed fox’. Rundell has a gift for precise and beautiful descriptions...
The book is full of lovely, startling scenes, such as one involving a white horse galloping through the early morning city, as well as a generous-hearted sense of adventure and companionship. Rundell uses, and gently subverts, the classic treasure-hunting story.
