Blog Tour – Scareground

Hello hello, and welcome or welcome back to my little bookish corner of the internet. Today is my stop on the blog tour for Scareground, a middle grade horror novel.

Synopsis
Roll up, roll up, the Scareground is in town!

Twelve-year-old Nancy Crumpet lives above a bakery and her life is a delightful mix of flour, salt, and love. Yet her mind is brimming with questions no one can answer: Why did her birth parents disappear? Why can she speak with the sky? And why must she keep her mysterious birthmark hidden?

Everything is about to change when the Scareground returns to Greenwich. Nancy is convinced it holds the answers to her parents’ disappearance. Nancy and her best friend Arthur Green meet the fair’s spooky owner, Skelter, and discover a world full of dark magic and mystery. Nancy must confront her greatest fears to get to the truth. But is she ready for all the secrets the Scareground will reveal?

Review
Rating: 3 stars
Roll up, roll up! The fair has come to town. But this isn’t just any fair…

When the black balloons start dropping from the sky, Nancy and her friend Arthur, along with all of the population of Greenwich jump at the change to attend a very special fair. A fair that claims to be as unique and individual as its eccentric owner, Skelter Tombola.

Nancy lives a safe life with her adopted parents, the Crumpets. Their baked goods are famed throughout Greenwich, and although pennies might be tight, there is always good food, and much love to go around the table. However, Nancy can’t help but wonder about all the things she doesn’t know: about her birth parents, about the mysterious birth mark on her wrist, and about just why the Crumpets really, really don’t want to talk about the fair…

Scareground manages to capture the energy of being young and curious, never fully content with what they have in that purely innocent way that gets us all into trouble at some point. For Nancy, searching for answers – and hiding her quest from Arthur – causes more trouble than she could have possibly imagined, and it may well take her a long time to decide if the destination was worth the ride.

The descriptions in the book are largely food focused, causing you to need snacks within reach as you turn the pages, as well as capturing the beautiful atmosphere of the adventures on the rooftops for Nancy especially. When it comes to looking at the rides themselves, the energy of the fair, and the rides that Nancy and Arthur dare to try, the author manages to grab the energy as clearly as Nancy reads the clouds, transporting you to the fair… if you dare.

About the Author
Angela Kecojevic is a senior librarian, author and creative writing tutor. She has written for the Oxford Reading Tree programme and the multi-award-winning adventure park Hobbledown where her characters can be seen walking around, something she still finds incredibly charming! She is a member of the Climate Writers Fiction League, a group of international authors who use climate issues in their work. Angela lives in the city of Oxford with her family.

Thanks for stopping by for this review today. Be sure to check out the other scheduled posts for the tour, and keep an eye out for other posts coming up. Drop me a follow below to make sure you never miss another!