Project and content management for Contemporary Authors volumes
WORK TITLE: Troublemakers
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 1983
WEBSITE: http://catherine-barter.com
CITY: London
STATE:
COUNTRY: England
NATIONALITY: British
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Born 1983, in Essex, England.
EDUCATION:Attended college in Norwich, England, Ph.D.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer, novelist, and bookshop manager. Housman’s, London, England, manager. Also worked for libraries, universities, and an organization named Labour Behind the Label campaigning for the rights of garment workers.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
Catherine Barter grew up in the market town of Stratford-upon-Avon, England, best known as the birthplace of William Shakespeare. Barter, who wanted to be a writer from the time she was a child, attended college and studied American literature. Barter began writing her debut novel, Troublemakers, in March, 2011, while taking a writing course at the Writers’ Centre Norwich.
“I was feeling very liberated after finishing a Ph.D. and wanted to start doing something completely different from academic writing,” Barter noted in an interview for the Minerva Reads website. Barter went on in the interview to note she did not start out to write a young adult (YA) novel. She remarked in the Minerva Reads interview: “I didn’t know a lot about YA until I started writing Troublemakers. Then I sort of fell in love with writing from the perspective of a teenager and realised that YA was the right home for the kind of story I wanted to tell.” Barter’s road to publication began when she was shortlisted for the Bath Novel Award in 2014, which led her to find an agent and a publisher.
Troublemakers revolves around fifteen-year-old Alena, whose activist mother died when Alena was only three years old. Since that time, she has been raised by her half-brother Danny, who is twenty years older than Alena, and his partner, Nick, in their East London home. The relationship between Danny and Nick becomes troubled after Danny starts working for a political candidate campaigning on a strict law-and-order platform. Meanwhile, the East End Bomber has been terrorizing local supermarkets. Danny’s boss uses the bombings to gain support for his agenda. The only problem is the language he uses in speeches, which Danny writes. Nick, however, is antiestablishment and displays such leaflets at his coffee shop. Nick cannot abide the candidate’s language, which Danny writes. Although they love each other, Danny’s job is creating a rift in their relationship. In addition, as noted by School Librarian contributor Anna Quick, the couple face “constant pressure to prove themselves to the world as ‘suitable’ parents.”
Eventually, the pressure becomes too much, and Nick and Danny decide to separate. Meanwhile, Alena has long wanted to know more about her mother, who was an antiwar activist labeled a political troublemaker. Alena’s mother was part of the Greenham Common Women’s Peace Camp, which was a famous 1980s camp established to protest the nuclear weapons being stored by the Royal Air Force at the Greenham Common in Berkshire, England. Danny, however, will not talk to Alena about their shared parent. Alena, who has always followed the rules, decides that she is going to find out more about her mother on her own, but she ends up getting help from her friends Ollie and Tegan.
At the same time, Danny becomes increasingly upset with Alena for looking into their mother’s past. It turns out that there are things Danny does not want Alena to know about their family. Eventually, Alena’s efforts, combined with a shopper getting killed in a bombing, lead to troubles, including Danny losing his job with the candidate. It turns out that Alena, like her mother, may be an avowed troublemaker.
Commenting on why she wanted to write Troublemakers, Barter remarked in an interview for the Shift the Zine website: “I’ve always been interested in family dynamics, particularly sibling relationships, so the idea for a story in which an older brother is also a parent, and the particular set of issues that raises, was my starting point.” Barter went on in the same interview to note that another inspiration came from “thinking about the frightening, politically turbulent times that we live in, and how that affects our lives.” She noted young adults are constantly faced with news about “terrorism and war and political upheaval.” Barter said she was interested in how young people work out these issues in their lives.
“Amid a … contemporary story about terrorism, email leaks, and a divisive political climate, Lena’s coming-of-age is wonderfully individual and heartbreakingly real,” wrote a Kirkus Reviews contributor. Jessica Anne Bratt, writing for Booklist, remarked: “Readers will connect with Lena on her dramatic, heartrending journey.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Booklist, March 1, 2018, Jessica Anne Bratt, review of Troublemakers, p. 52.
Kirkus Reviews, February 15, 2018, review of Troublemakers.
Publishers Weekly, February 12, 2018, review of Troublemakers, p. 79.
School Librarian, autumn, 2017, Anna Quick, review of Troublemakers,p. 180.
School Library Journal, March, 2018, Mitchell Berman, review of Troublemakers, p. 114.
ONLINE
Catherine Barter Website, http://catherine-barter.com (July 7, 2018).
Lerner Blog, https://lernerbooks.blog/ (July 7, 2018), Libby Stille, “A Note to Readers from YA Author Catherine Barter.”
MinervaReads, http://www.minervareads.com/ (June 28, 2017), “Q&A with Catherine Barter, Author of Troublemakers.
Shift the Zine, http://www.shiftthezine.co.uk/ (July 15, 2017), “Shift Talks to Catherine Barter.”
Catherine Barter grew up in Stratford-upon-Avon, a market town in the middle of England best known as Shakespeare's birthplace. When she was eighteen I moved to Norwich to study American literature at university, and stayed there for the next ten years (except for one year living in Plattsburgh, New York). She has worked in libraries, bookshops, universities and an organization campaigning for the rights of garment workers. Currently she lives in East London and co-manages Housmans, a radical bookshop in King's Cross.
Q&A with Catherine Barter, author of Troublemakers
by Minerva • June 28, 2017
I had the recent good fortune to not only review Catherine’s debut novel, Troublemakers, but also to chair a panel conversation between Catherine and Keren David, author of The Liar’s Handbook, among others. For those of you unable to attend, I also sneaked in a cheeky Q&A with Catherine so that I could share it with you here. Troublemakers is an unusual YA novel – it’s contemporary, about politics, and very apt in the current political climate. Set in London, it’s a coming-of-age novel that speaks of activism, terrorism, and family relationships.
I understand that you worked for an organisation campaigning for the rights of garment workers. Have you always been involved in political activism of some kind?
That’s right, I used to work for a brilliant organisation called Labour Behind the Label. I mostly did office admin – answering emails, stuffing envelopes, that kind of thing. I’m much too shy to be any good at direct action or street protest, so where I’ve been involved in activism it’s mainly been doing boring, behind-the-scenes things.
I’ve always been quite political, and my family talked politics a lot, but I think I got particularly switched on to it in my teens. When I was about sixteen I had that Naomi Klein book, No Logo, which a lot of people were reading at the time, and I got quite caught up in the idea of fighting back against global capitalism. Not that I exactly knew what that meant (I’m not sure I actually got to the end of No Logo), but I could tell it was important!
And then the Iraq War began the year that I started university, and I went on one of the marches against it, as did a lot of young people that year. So that was my first introduction to that kind of mass movement activism. You care very passionately about things when you’re a teenager, so I think it’s a good time to get interested in politics and activism.
You co-manage a radical bookshop (Housmans). What’s the most rewarding part of the job?
I love when young people come in to the shop looking for copies of old radical classics, things like bell hooks’ Ain’t I A Woman or Frantz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth. You get the feeling they’re just getting started on their political journeys and they’re putting in the groundwork by reading all these big, difficult, important books. And they’re really excited about it. I love seeing that.
Did the attacks on Housmans in the past in some way inspire what happens to Nick’s coffee shop in Troublemakers?
Hmm! I actually never thought about that link, but maybe on some level it was inspired by that. There’s definitely a bit of Housmans in Nick’s coffee shop, and working in the shop has made me aware that any business which has its politics up-front makes itself vulnerable to some extent. We do still get far-right people coming in to shout at us sometimes, and I can imagine Nick’s coffee shop with all its activist posters in the window would get the same.
When did you start writing Troublemakers?
I can be very specific! It was March 2011, when I took a six-week course at Writers’ Centre Norwich. I was feeling very liberated after finishing a PhD and wanted to start doing something completely different from academic writing.
Did you always want to write YA?
No. I didn’t know a lot about YA until I started writing Troublemakers. Then I sort of fell in love with writing from the perspective of a teenager and realised that YA was the right home for the kind of story I wanted to tell. Which was really exciting.
How did you feel to be shortlisted for the Bath Novel Award?
I was so happy. I can remember that whole day really vividly. It was gratifying because after I was longlisted, and before I submitted the full manuscript for the next stage, I’d worked really hard to fix all the problems that I knew the book had. I was still rewriting until the last possible moment, because I knew I could make it better. So I was thrilled when all that work paid off.
This is your debut novel. Tell me your route to publication.
After the shortlist was announced, the organiser of the Bath Novel Award, Caroline Ambrose, contacted literary agents to let them know about the books and authors on the list. As a result of that, a few agents requested to see my complete manuscript. Two of those offered to represent me–but one of them wanted me to write a different book, and one of them wanted to work on Troublemakers. So that was an easy decision! I did quite a lot of editing with my agent, who then sent the book out into the world, where it found a home with Andersen Press.
You wrote a PhD on Sherman Alexie. What attracted you to him?
I’d never heard of Sherman Alexie until I read one of his short story collections for a class on ‘multi-ethnic American literatures’. Then I got completely hooked. His writing is very funny and very sad, very immediate and sometimes flawed and all the more alive and interesting because of that. It’s very layered and political, too, and writing about his fiction was also a way to write and think about American history and politics and storytelling traditions. So all of that was very appealing. And he’s also written one of my favourite YA novels ever, The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian.
What are you working on next?
It’s still in a bit of a fragile, embryonic stage, but I’m working on a story about four friends in a desolate Norfolk seaside town in winter. So it’s a completely different setting from Troublemakers, which has been fun to write.
Thank you so much to Catherine for agreeing to answer yet more questions. I encourage you all to read Troublemakers, it’s one of the best YA published this year. You can purchase it here.
A Note to Readers from YA Author Catherine Barter
By Libby Stille, Associate Publicist
The US edition of Catherine Barter’s YA novel Troublemakers launches on April 1! Troublemakers follows 15-year-old Alena as she seeks to find out the truth about what happened to her activist mother. Meanwhile, her brother Danny’s job working for a conservative politician worries his longtime boyfriend Nick, who runs a fair-trade coffee shop.
In a starred review, Kirkus Reviews said of the novel, “Amid a thoroughly contemporary story about terrorism, email leaks, and a divisive political climate, Lena’s coming-of-age is wonderfully individual and heartbreakingly real.”
We asked Catherine to write a note to her US readers ahead of the book’s release.
A note to Troublemakers readers
Dear reader,
For a lot of the time that I was working on Troublemakers, I was working in a radical bookshop in London, called Housmans. I still am, in fact. Radical can seem like a scary word these days, but it’s not, really. It comes from the Latin word for root. Radical bookshops are places that seek to inspire social change from the ground up. Our shelves are crammed with books on feminism, socialism, anarchism, anti-racism—all kinds of different social justice movements.
I meet lots of interesting people in Housmans, including some who’ve spent their whole lives dedicated to political activism. It’s inspiring, but it also makes me realize that caring passionately about the world sometimes has a personal cost. And that, no matter how hard you fight, there will always be some things that you can’t change.
That’s partly what Troublemakers is about: the things you can’t change, and the things you can.
The main character, Alena, discovers that her mother was an anti-war activist, a political troublemaker who took part in the Greenham Common Women’s Peace Camp, a famous protest against nuclear weapons that took part in Britain in the 1980s. And, in the midst of a divisive election campaign that’s hitting a little too close to home, Alena is starting to wonder if she might have to be a bit of a troublemaker herself.
But her older brother, who’s also her guardian, is less concerned with the safety of the world than he is with the safety of his own family. The two of them are on the path to a conflict that will change their relationship forever.
This is a story about families, love, loss, politics, and coffee, inspired by the politically turbulent times we live in, and the fact that I’ve always loved stories about siblings.
I hope you enjoy it.
1. I was born in Essex but I grew up in Stratford upon Avon, a market town in Warwickshire best known as Shakespeare's birthplace
2. I went to university in Norwich when I was eighteen and ended up staying there for the next ten years
3. Except for the year I lived in Plattsburgh, New York
4. I studied American literature and continue to be a bit of an American literature geek.
5. I now live in east London and co-manage a bookshop called Housmans.
6. I always wanted to be a writer... but I also always wanted to be a journalist, singer, actor, doctor, lawyer, gymnast, surf instructor, bookseller, human rights campaigner, hacker, or librarian.
7. Some of my favourite writers (right now) include: Judy Blume, David Almond, Ani DiFranco, Bruce Springsteen, David Foster Wallace, Louise O'Neill, Patrick Ness, Maggie Nelson, Colson Whitehead, Tana French, Margaret Atwood, Junot Diaz, Aaron Sorkin, Roxane Gay and Lin-Manuel Miranda.
8. I like scary movies. Some of my favourites (right now) include: The Shining, The Blair Witch Project, The Exorcist, Jaws, Rec, the entire Paranormal Activity franchise, The Woman in Black (80s BBC made-for-tv version), The Orphanage, Lake Mungo... I've got a soft spot for even the trashiest of found-footage horror films. Don't know what this says about me.
9. My road to publication? It started when I was shortlisted for the Bath Novel Award in 2014. Finding an agent and a publisher all happened because of that.
Shift talks to Catherine Barter
shiftworker
Hello Catherine, welcome to Shift! Troublemakers is your debut YA novel. Can you tell us a bit about it?
Yes! Troublemakers is about a fifteen year old girl, Alena, who has been raised by her much older brother Danny and his partner Nick. Her mother was a political activist who died when Alena was three, and her life and death are a mystery to Alena because Danny refuses to talk about her.
Danny gets a job working for an opportunistic politician, who is promising to keep people safe in the wake of a recent spate of bombings, and Alena is convinced that her mother would have hated this. That conflict leads to a family breakdown and an act of rebellion with unintended consequences. It’s a story about family secrets, love, grief and politics.
What made you want to write Troublemakers? Where did Alena’s story come from?
I’ve always been interested in family dynamics, particularly sibling relationships, so the idea for a story in which an older brother is also a parent, and the particular set of issues that raises, was my starting point. Their relationship is full of love but also really complicated.
I was also inspired by thinking about the frightening, politically turbulent times that we live in, and how that affects our lives. Young adults today have grown up in a world where the headlines are dominated by terrorism and war and political upheaval… and how you deal with normal, day-to-day life while constantly being exposed to all of the terrible things happening in the world is something everybody has to work out in their own way.
Despite being siblings, Danny and Alena have had really different upbringings, and so their responses to the world are really different, too. Alena’s story comes from that, I think: trying to work out who you are and how you’re going to live amidst all the chaos of the world.
Troublemakers is a book about politics without being political. How did you achieve this balance?
Some books are really fiercely political. Louise O’Neill’s Asking For It, for instance, or something like The Handmaid’s Tale – these are ferociously feminist books that make powerful statements about society. Which is brilliant – fiction should definitely try to change the world! – and these are wonderful, character-driven stories, too. I’d love to write something like that one day.
But with Troublemakers I wanted to write about the way politics affects people’s lives and relationships, and how different people respond to the fear and political anxiety that surrounds us.
Danny is very anxious and overprotective, and completely different from his mother, who would put herself in danger in order to fight for her beliefs. Danny’s partner Nick is far more politically idealistic and positive. While Alena is still working out what kind of person she is. I wanted to explore all of those responses sympathetically, so I tried to avoid making too much of a political argument myself – I didn’t want any of the characters to be ‘right’.
That said, the story does also touch on the ways in which politicians and other people with power sometimes exploit our fears about things like terrorism for their own purposes–which is something I’m critical of, and that probably does come through a little bit. So it’s not totally apolitical.
How much of an influence do Danny and Nick have on Alena’s choices in Troublemakers?
Ooh, interesting question. A big influence, I guess. She has a really strong relationship with Nick so she’s definitely influenced by him. The Fairtrade coffee shop that he runs is like a second home to her and she wants to work there one day. She spends a lot of time rebelling against Danny in the story, and playing Nick and Danny off against each other. But rebelling against someone usually means they’re influencing your behaviour, too.
Ultimately she’s taking all of these influences and working out who she herself wants to be.
Why is it important for young people to get involved in politics?
We’re all involved with politics one way or another – like it or not. If you go to school or university or have a job, or if you ever need to use a hospital, if you care about the environment, if you care about who makes your clothes, if you’ve ever experienced racism or sexism or homophobia – then politics is affecting your life. Getting actively involved is an act of self-defense as much as anything – it’s a way of making sure your voice and your experiences are heard.
What advice would you give to young adults who want to be involved in politics?
There’s lots of different ways to be involved in politics, so don’t feel that you’re useless if you don’t want to be, or aren’t able to be, out on marches every weekend.
I got involved in politics through volunteering, which I think is a brilliant thing to do if you can. You can volunteer for political parties or charities or your local park – there’s all kinds of things you can do. Stuffing envelopes or doing a shift in a charity shop is activism! Being creative and making art can be political too. We’re not all super-confident, outgoing people who want to make speeches. You can still be involved in politics if you’re shy. Follow your instincts and think about your own, specific talents, and what you’ve got to offer.
Look after yourself and always be prepared to change your mind: you don’t have to know what you think about everything straight away.
Can you recommend any other YA with political themes that we need to read?
Everyone has already read The Hate U Give, but – The Hate U Give. The Big Lie by Julie Mayhew. The Bone Sparrow by Zana Fraillon. The Noughts & Crosses series by Malorie Blackman is obviously a classic. The Trap by Alan Gibbons (who writes lots of politically engaged YA). There’s a beautiful collection of short stories called Here I Stand: Stories that Speak for Freedom which was published last year, and its list of contributors is amazing. I highly recommend that one.
There’s also some great historical fiction with strong political themes. Catherine Johnson’s Blade and Bone and Lydia Syson’s Liberty’s Fire come to mind. And Things a Bright Girl Can Do by Sally Nichols is out soon – suffragettes!
What’s next for you? Will we be seeing more YA from you in the future?
I hope so! I’m working on a story about a group of friends living in a desolate seaside town, but it’s still in an early, fragile state, and I can’t say anything else for fear it will all turn to dust when exposed to the light.
15th July 2017
Troublemakers
Jessica Anne Bratt
Booklist. 114.13 (Mar. 1, 2018): p52.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Full Text:
Troublemakers. By Catherine Barter. Apr. 2018. 360p. Carolrhoda/Lab, $17.99 (9781512475494). Gr. 8-11.
Alena has lived with her brother, Danny, since she was three. She knows he and his boyfriend share secrets about Alena and Danny's mother's troubled life. But every time Lena tries to talk to Danny about it, he shuts her down. At 15, Lena feels old enough to handle the truth, and if Danny won't give it to her, well, she'll start making trouble herself by trying to dig up the real story. Her two friends, Ollie and Tegan, will be there to help her through the triumphs and sorrows that soon come, as Lena tries to navigate her confusing past and uncertain future with a frightening present--an unknown person called the East End Bomber is terrorizing her area of London. Barter's debut displays impressive skill and authenticity in relating issues of family secrets and grief. Readers will connect with Lena on her dramatic, heartrending journey as she begins to suss out the ambiguity of other people's choices and fateful decisions that happened long before she was born.--Jessica Anne Bratt
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Bratt, Jessica Anne. "Troublemakers." Booklist, 1 Mar. 2018, p. 52. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A532250955/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=75055975. Accessed 28 May 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A532250955
Barter, Catherine: TROUBLEMAKERS
Kirkus Reviews. (Feb. 15, 2018):
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 Kirkus Media LLC
http://www.kirkusreviews.com/
Full Text:
Barter, Catherine TROUBLEMAKERS Carolrhoda Lab (Young Adult Fiction) $17.99 4, 1 ISBN: 978-1-5124-7549-4
A 15-year-old London girl struggles with family tensions against a backdrop of bombings, crime, and political skulduggery.
Lena, whose mum died when she was only 3, has been lovingly raised by her brother, Danny (20 years her senior), and his partner, Nick. But Danny's just gotten a job working for a law-and-order political candidate, and now there's constant tension at home. There's a bomber attacking East London supermarkets, and Danny's boss--in statements Danny wrote for him--uses anti-crime language that Nick, who runs a hippie coffee shop that displays anti-establishment leaflets, despises. As the couple decide to separate to ease the tension in their relationship, Lena becomes increasingly curious about the mother she doesn't remember, further infuriating her brother. Why is Danny so hostile toward their mother's old friends? Real life is messy, Lena learns. As well as that: You don't have to be political to be moral; good people sometimes do rotten things; doing right sometimes hurts the wrong people; and you don't always get cinematic closure with the secrets of your past. Several secondary characters represent the multiculturalism of modern London; Lena and her family are assumed white.
Amid a thoroughly contemporary story about terrorism, email leaks, and a divisive political climate, Lena's coming-of-age is wonderfully individual and heartbreakingly real. (Realistic fiction. 12-16)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Barter, Catherine: TROUBLEMAKERS." Kirkus Reviews, 15 Feb. 2018. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A527247972/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=512be99b. Accessed 28 May 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A527247972
Troublemakers
Publishers Weekly. 265.7 (Feb. 12, 2018): p79.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Troublemakers
Catherine Barter. Carolrhoda Lab, $17.99
(360p) ISBN 978-1-5124-7549-4
Barter debuts with an engrossing family story set in London. Danny became the legal guardian of his younger sister, Alena, when she was three and he was 22, after their mother died. Alena is 15 as the novel opens, and she yearns to learn more about her activist mother, but even the smallest question sends Danny into a rage. Only Nick, Danny's longtime partner and Alena's second dad, will engage with her on the subject. Though Alena has plenty of strong friendships, and everyone is talking about a bomber terrorizing London's East End, the focus of this novel is on her family, her growing conflict with Danny about their mother, and the job he's taken managing the campaign of a conservative candidate, to Nick's chagrin. Barter confidently laces conflict and tension into the relationships among Nick, Danny, and Alena, drawing out the hardships they've faced during a decade of grief, doing their best to be a stable family. The bomber subplot feels peripheral, a device intended to add urgency, but Barter's novel should appeal to a wide audience for its emotional honesty and its complex characters and relationships. Ages 13--up. (Apr.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
"Troublemakers." Publishers Weekly, 12 Feb. 2018, p. 79. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A528615570/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=4414f5c6. Accessed 28 May 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A528615570
BARTER, Catherine. Troublemakers
Mitchell Berman
School Library Journal. 64.3 (Mar. 2018): p114.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2018 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
http://www.schoollibraryjournal.com/
Full Text:
BARTER, Catherine. Troublemakers. 360p. Carolrhoda Lab. Apr. 2018. Tr $17.99. ISBN 9781512475494.
Gr 9 Up--Alena has grown up in confusion about who her mother really was. When she was three, her mother passed away, and she has been living with her half brother and his boyfriend in London. Alena really wants to know where she came from and her brother is tight lipped about her mother because there are some skeletons in the closet. Alena starts digging up the past, and what she finds can put her entire family in jeopardy. The story starts out slow, but moves as Alena starts to find the truth about her background. Barter is adept at character development, but some of the writing lacks in complexity and falls flat. A lot of the chapters are short and choppy, which keeps the pace lively hut fails to engage readers fully in the narrative. Teens will slog through and may not want to finish reading. VERDICT Not recommended.--Mitchell Berman, Zion-Benton Public Library, Zion, IL
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Berman, Mitchell. "BARTER, Catherine. Troublemakers." School Library Journal, Mar. 2018, p. 114. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A529863594/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=27384e8f. Accessed 28 May 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A529863594
Barter, Catherine: Troublemakers
Anna Quick
School Librarian. 65.3 (Autumn 2017): p180.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2017 The School Library Association
http://www.sla.org.uk/school-librarian.php
Full Text:
Barter, Catherine
Troublemakers
Andersen, 2017, pp384, 7.99 [pounds sterling]
978 1 78344 524 0
This first novel by Catherine Barter is gripping and fresh in tone. Lena is an average 15-year-old Londoner and an orphan: her much older brother Danny and his partner Nick are her parental figures. However, like many parents Danny has flaws: he won't talk about their mother, and Lena becomes fascinated with her history of activism. Then Danny starts working for an opportunist politician riding the security and surveillance bandwagon (sound familiar?) after a supermarket bomb kills a tourist. His job leads Lena to do something irreversible, which tests the family and uncovers the past.
Lena's voice as narrator and her school friendships are funny and convincing. Danny and Nick love each other but fight constantly, bitterly opposed over Danny's job. Their constant pressure to prove themselves to the world as 'suitable' parents is gently contrasted with the uncaring parents of Lena's friend Ollie. This book would be enjoyed by both adults and teenagers, and could be a good class reader for English, PSHE or History, to stimulate political discussion.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Quick, Anna. "Barter, Catherine: Troublemakers." School Librarian, Autumn 2017, p. 180. General OneFile, http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A506957461/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=aefd777a. Accessed 28 May 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A506957461