Contemporary Authors

• Sal - 2018 Canongate Books, Edinburgh

• A Novel Love - https://anovellove.co.uk/an-evening-with-mick-kitson-event-review/

  An evening with Mick Kitson – Event review
  MARCH 20, 2018
  Sal Mick Kitson
  I rarely go to book events for authors that are unknown to me (but I’m working on changing that!) but after reading the blurb for Sal by Mick Kitson I knew I had to not only buy the book, but had to go to the event that Waterstones Edinburgh West End was hosting featuring the author!

  As usual I turned up too early, and I took my front row, centre seat (I’m not shy!) and excitedly waited for the evening to begin.

  The evening followed a standard ‘An Evening With’ format: the author speaks about the book via prompted questions from a representative, then does a reading, talks a bit more and then there’s a book signing.

  I fully enjoyed the evening; this was Mick’s first book and he spoke with such passion about it and was genuinely funny throughout.

  I do feel like I have to mention one tiny thing that bothered me though. I’m gonna give a spoiler warning here for Sal that I wish I’d have had on the evening, as well as one for Game of Thrones (for those who have no idea about anything to do with it). So, yeah, SPOILER WARNING! The representative said at one point in the evening that Sal kills Robert then she said it wasn’t really a spoiler. Now, for me it was. Yes , this happens near the beginning of the book so we know about it super early, but there was no immediate hint in the opening pages that this was going to happen and it would have been far more impactful for me to have discovered that through reading the story, rather than have it spoiled at an event. I mean, Ned Stark gets killed in Season 1 of Game of Thrones which is relatively early in the Game of Thrones storyline, but I’d have been pissed if someone told me that and justified it by saying “oh yeah, but it happens in the beginning of the story”.

  Anyway, huff over.

  So here’s the part where I’d like to share a few of the questions and answers from the night (all paraphrased) – enjoy!:

  You were frustrated with the novels you used to have to teach when you were an English teacher and you wrote Sal to be the kind of book you wish you could have taught. What was bad about the books you had to teach?
  I either really love a book and become obsessed about it or I have a savage hatred of books I don’t like and I usually know if I’ll like something within 40 pages. I’ve read a lot of books and I found a lot of things I didn’t like and I just wanted to write a book that had none of those things in it – remember this is just my own personal opinion and not a logical critique of literature! I hate novels that are set in London and big urban, sophisticated centres. I hate novels that are about the sort of privileged middle-classes. I also really don’t like the present tense as the overall narrative form – I find it really annoying and it’s become incredibly fashionable in the last few years.

  I like the past tense because, when I read, I still have this thing about going into another world. Somehow when it’s in the past tense I find it’s easier to go there.

  Sal Mick Kitson

  How does the internet change the modern adventure/survival story?
  Sal is someone of her generation where her major point of contact is digital – through her phone or a screen. She has a different way of accessing a huge amount of culture, just not in the same way as previous generations would have had access.

  Sal’s one of those kids who has to be old before her time – is that something you saw a lot of when you were teaching?
  Yeah, I saw a lot of kids who came from that type of background. Those sorts of children have a sort of hyper-vigilance where they notice everything. They pay attention to details; their survival often depends on them noticing things like, for example, if mother is in a certain type of mood when she’s been drinking – that will affect their day to day life.

  Sal is 13 years old in the novel; she also has her first period during the novel. Obviously that was deliberate – what did you want to tell the reader by including this sort of transitional time for Sal?
  One thing I knew when I decided to write the book was that I knew my narrator would be 12 or 13 years old- partly because nearly all great narrators in literature start off at that age. What is it about that age? I suppose it’s kind of looking two ways – back to childhood and forward to adult. It’s an age where your vision suddenly widens.

  ***

  Here’s the blurb from Sal so you can understand why I wanted to read it so much and go to the event!

  This is a story of something like survival. Sal planned it for almost a year before they ran.

  She nicked an Ordnance Survey map from the school library. She bought a compass, a Bear Grylls knife, waterproofs and a first aid kit from Amazon using stolen credit cards. She read the SAS Survival Handbook and watched loads of YouTube videos.

  And now Sal knows a lot of stuff. Like how to build a shelter and start a fire. How to estimate distances, snare rabbits and shoot an airgun. And how to protect her sister, Peppa. Because Peppa is ten, which is how old Sal was when Robert started on her.

  Told in Sal’s distinctive voice, and filled with the silent, dizzying beauty of rural Scotland, Sal is a disturbing, uplifting story of survival, of the kindness of strangers, and the irrepressible power of sisterly love; a love that can lead us to do extraordinary and unimaginable things.

  You can buy Sal here and get free worldwide delivery!

  ***

  Look out for my review of Sal – coming soon!

  As always, I would like to extend my personal thanks to Waterstones for hosting this event.

  [PLEASE NOTE]: I was not paid or sponsored to write this event review (although Waterstones, if you’re reading this – I’m up for it!) All opinions are honest and my own

• Amazon - https://www.amazon.com/Sal-Mick-Kitson/dp/1786891875

  Mick Kitson was born in South Wales, and studied English at university before launching the prolific 80s pop band, The Senators, with his brother Jim. He worked as a journalist for several years, then went on to become an English teacher.

  Mick lives in Fife, Scotland with his wife Jill and bad-tempered dog Lucy. He has three grown-up children, and spends more time than is good for him fly fishing for sea trout, reading, playing the banjo and growing strawberries. He also builds boats. Sal is his first novel.

9/24/2018 General OneFile - Saved Articles
http://go.galegroup.com/ps/marklist.do?actionCmd=GET_MARK_LIST&userGroupName=schlager&inPS=true&prodId=ITOF&ts=1537846648165 1/1
Print Marked Items
Sal
Bridget Thoreson
Booklist.
114.16 (Apr. 15, 2018): p21.
COPYRIGHT 2018 American Library Association
http://www.ala.org/aboutala/offices/publishing/booklist/
Full Text:
Sal.
By Mick Kitson.
May 2018. 250p. Canongate, $20 (9781786891877).
Sal is not a spur-of-the-moment runaway. With her 10-year-old sister, Peppa, in tow, 13-year-old Sal
prepared for this day, when they would start living in the Scottish wilderness armed with some supplies she
secretly bought online and the knowledge she gained from YouTube videos and the STS' Survival
Handbook. Pressed by the immediate concerns of finding food, shelter, and warmth, the intrepid teenager
slowly reveals the circumstances that led them here. She knew she had to run to save her sister from Robert,
their mother's live-in boyfriend, because Peppa was about the age Sal had been when Robert started abusing
her. And now Robert is dead. As the days turn into weeks, the girls meet another resident of the woods who
once was a doctor in West Germany and vows to keep their secret safe. Startling in its simplicity and
immediacy, told from Sal's undeniably practical perspective, this remarkable debut novel is a story of
courage, lost innocence, and freedom. Sal memorably unpacks the skills needed for survival, of all kinds.--
Bridget Thoreson
YA: A powerful survival story sure to hook teen readers. BT.
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Thoreson, Bridget. "Sal." Booklist, 15 Apr. 2018, p. 21. General OneFile,
http://link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/A537268057/ITOF?u=schlager&sid=ITOF&xid=4cfb5dcb.
Accessed 24 Sept. 2018.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A537268057

• The Guardian
  https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/mar/14/sal-mick-kitson-debut-review-sisters-children-runaways
  Word count: 874

  Sal by Mick Kitson review – deft, witty portrait of runaway sisters
  This skilled debut follows two children as they escape from abuse and disappear into the Scottish wilderness

  Jenni Fagan

  Wed 14 Mar 2018 05.00 EDT Last modified on Tue 20 Mar 2018 08.48 EDT
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  Rannoch Moor in the Scottish Highlands
  Rannoch Moor in the Scottish Highlands … ‘The depictions of wilderness survival will appeal to anyone who dreams of escaping the confines of modern life.’ Photograph: Alamy Stock Photo
  Sal is the debut novel of Mick Kitson, a journalist turned teacher who was frustrated with the books that appeared on the curriculum and set out to write something he would want to teach. In 13-year-old Sal it has a strong and distinctive first-person narrator. Sal is on the run with her 10-year-old sister, the witty and compelling Peppa. After a year of watching YouTube videos and learning about survival, they run away into the Scottish wilderness in search of safety and redemption.

  Early on we find out that Sal has killed her alcoholic mother’s boyfriend, Robert, who has been sexually abusing her for five years. She had kept this a secret, placing a lock on her younger sister’s door to protect her, but when Peppa turns 10, Sal realises the lock will no longer be enough. After an act of ultimate self-defence, she grabs Peppa and they flee.

  Sal’s main fear seems to be that she and her sister might be taken into care and split up. Their mother used to threaten them with this, as did Robert. “He said Peppa would get fostered and adopted by Africans because she is half an African and I’d get adopted by old people and we wouldn’t be together. And that is never going to happen.” Sal’s observations of her sister are compelling and beautiful. “She is either still like a stone or going really fast. She eats fast and she talks fast.” The sisters’ relationship is a real highlight of the book, and the differences in their personalities are well drawn.

  Sal would not be capable of such fierce and selfless affection had she not an understanding of morality and love
  Sal talks about Instagram and Snapchat; she says the internet is mostly for porn, although she prefers it as a source of factual information. I loved Sal for her pragmatic approach to the world: the girls’ loyalty and humour carries them through brutal circumstances. The sisters’ relationship also counteracts the impression that Sal perhaps has no emotional compass. While she says she does not see the point in feelings, or understand the difference between action and emotion, she would not be capable of such fierce and selfless affection for her sister had she not an understanding of morality and love. This is something Kitson conveys with a deft hand and it keeps the reader firmly on Sal’s side. The addition of hippy survivalist Ingrid, whom they meet in the wilderness, introduces another brilliant female character.

  Some descriptions suggest the novel’s inspirations span decades, although it is set in the present. Sal mentions kids at school such as “the boys who were all headbangers and druggies and in gangs. The twins were a year older than me and they never spoke either, but they battered kids all over the school and when they walked down the corridors everyone got out their way. They both wore the same clothes and gold chains and shell suits and Nikes.” These passages err on the side of stereotype and nod more toward late 80s or early 90s fashion.

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  Extreme themes can manipulate a reader’s emotions: they must be there for the right reasons. As someone who was a teenage runaway and who grew up in the care system, I opened this novel wondering why a middle-aged man wanted to write the story of two young girls, and their experiences of poverty and sexual abuse. But writers filter the collective consciousness, and literature is beginning to depict competent, wild, vulnerable kids who are having to separate themselves from a society that does not protect them. Four million children live in poverty in the UK: that is 30% of all children. As a father and schoolteacher Kitson has no doubt witnessed some of the social consequences of such an environment. I did not get the impression that he picked this subject with a journalistic eye. Rather, the voices of Sal, Peppa and Ingrid have genuinely called to him.

  Kitson writes clearly and concisely. The depictions of wilderness survival are detailed and will appeal to anyone who dreams of escaping the confines of modern life. The girls’ capability, humanity and humour are inspiring and wonderful. Sal is an ambitious and skilled novel. Literature needs more stories like this.

  • Jenni Fagan’s latest novel is The Sunlight Pilgrims (Windmill). Sal is published by Canongate. To order a copy for £11.04 (RRP £12.99) go to bookshop.theguardian.com or call 0330 333 6846. Free UK p&p over £10, online orders only. Phone orders min p&p of £1.99.

• Financial Times
  https://www.ft.com/content/15cb434c-0dac-11e8-bacb-2958fde95e5e
  Word count: 1019

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  Fiction Add to myFT
  Sal by Mick Kitson — born survivors
  Two sisters in flight from a troubled home find solace in the Scottish wilderness

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  Susie Boyt FEBRUARY 16, 2018 Print this page1
  Many novels chart the progress of clever and courageous children who prove themselves magnificent in the face of maltreatment and loss. Perhaps the greatest of these is What Maisie Knew by Henry James. James’s young heroine knows both too much and not enough to thrive in the bitter post-divorce world into which she is thrust, relying on trial and error and a sort of spry, visceral optimism to carry her through.

  The idea of knowledge is also key in Mick Kitson’s first novel Sal, for its 13-year-old eponymous heroine Salmarina Brown craves facts as others crave drugs and alcohol. Sal’s hunger for knowledge (“What matters is knowing stuff and doing things”) represents a desire for power and stability, but it is also a symptom of blind panic. Sal uses knowledge to soothe and steady herself — a sort of benign addiction with its roots in salvation, occupying her heart and mind in the way religion might have done in an earlier era.

  Sal tells the story of two daring half-sisters who escape to the wilds of Scotland from a small town near Glasgow, after the older girl, Sal, has killed their abusive stepfather. With equipment they’ve bought with stolen credit cards, and the SAS Survival Handbook — does a more dignified self-help volume exist? — they catch a train disguised in the smart uniform of a fancy school and set up home in the wilderness. Eight miles from the nearest human habitation, they employ ancient techniques of forestry and homesteading gleaned from YouTube and TV endurance shows. They make an elaborate shelter, light fires, dig a “latrine” and live off Dundee cake, belVita biscuits, raisins and the odd pheasant or fish or rabbit that they kill with their stepfather’s air gun or carefully assembled snares.

  At night Sal gives her bright-hearted little sister Peppa the best bits of the history she has learnt at school. Sal is proud of Peppa’s high spirits, of her quick-wittedness and neat turns of phrase; “It’s guy dreich the day,” Peppa says when the skies darken. “Someone’s found the key to the pie cupboard,” Peppa pronounces when a large person comes into view. Sal, earnest, responsible and stoic, can scarcely believe her own flesh and blood could be so carefree.

  This novel is very good on how children from the same families can experience wholly different childhoods. Sal has been rubbing the hard edges off everything for Peppa all their lives, closing doors so she cannot see bad things. At times Peppa seems so happy on their adventure Sal wishes she could record it on the phone she had to leave behind. Yet Sal knows this new amazing life they have embarked on is a sort of fool’s paradise waiting to explode. She is still in shock following the violent death of her stepfather, traumatised from the years of abuse she suffered at his hands, and stunned by her mother’s failure to keep her out of harm’s way. She is also chastened by her own unwavering commitment to providing her little sister with the childhood she herself never had. Being “took and split up” has been her life’s biggest fear, the threat of social services looming like a monster over the little two-person unit.

  Children in need often have to believe quite a lot of things that aren’t true to survive. Sal makes excuses for her mother’s reckless actions at the very second the desire to condemn her rises up in her heart. Swallowing Google, somehow, has been a good defence against balancing these difficult equations. There is great comfort to be found in knowing all the feeding habits of badgers or the laying customs of birds of prey or how to gut and roast a pike. Violence in nature is ordinary and necessary, so that is comforting too. Sal has an almost poetic attachment to list-making. “I know how to nick stuff and how to read timetables . . . I also know how to use a drill and fit locks in doors . . . I can clean and hoover and make a healthy meal plan . . . ” At these moments, in the middle of the wilderness, she seems like a miniature Walt Whitman.

  Of course, matters of taste come into play in a novel rooted in childhood suffering. The layering of life-affirming adventures, enchanting children and nature at its most sublime, with addiction, neglect and vile sexual abuse, is daring. A cynical reader might find Sal’s mumsy conversational style grating or a little Krankie-esque. Her almost Everest-worthy survival skills could be called into question. Peppa’s occasional reciting of Robert Burns might provoke a little eye-rolling.

  Yet Sal is an inspiring novel that feels honest and fastidious. It introduces the theme of redemption and fresh beginnings without shying from the awful truth that for these girls and others like them, despite their solid heroism, things may well not improve in their lives.

  Sal, by Mick Kitson, Canongate, RRP£12.99, 240 pages

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• The Press and Journal
  https://www.pressandjournal.co.uk/fp/lifestyle/books-reviews/1443598/book-review-sal-by-mick-kitson/
  Word count: 251

  LIFESTYLE / BOOKS
  Book Review: Sal by Mick Kitson
  by P&J reporter April 5, 2018, 3:00 pm

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  The eponymous teenage heroine of Mick Kitson’s debut novel, who is on the run from the drab, chaotic lives of her alcoholic mother and her ‘Maw’s’ drug-dealing partner, steps into another world in Scotland’s last wilderness.

  Kitson’s ability to combine the mundane and harrowing with an uplifting, giddy traipse through the great outdoors, with characters who take you with them, belies the fact this is his first venture into fiction.

  Despite the odd jarring note and some patchy moments, he succeeds in giving voice to the troubled narrator and in handling her sometimes upsetting story.

  He captures the stillness, peace and beauty of her new surroundings and some joyous experiences as Sal and her sister battle hunger and cold, and shake off some old horrors.

  Armed with her Bear Grylls knife, YouTube education on the wild, and the SAS Survival Guide, Sal desperately tries to come up with a blueprint for her family’s survival.

  Along the way she has to find out if she is as adept at using her own streetwise, survival handbook to confront and escape life’s traps as she is at setting snares in the woods.

  An inventive, memorable and soul-stirring read.

• The Sydney Morning Herald
  https://www.smh.com.au/entertainment/books/sal-review-mick-kitson-captures-the-convincing-voice-of-an-abused-narrator-20180412-h0ynpv.html
  Word count: 210

  ENTERTAINMENTBOOKS
  Sal review: Mick Kitson captures the convincing voice of an abused narrator
  By Kerryn Goldsworthy
  12 April 2018 — 11:11am
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  Sal

  Mick Kitson

  Sal. By Mick Kitson.
  Sal. By Mick Kitson.

  Canongate, $27.99

  Peppa and her sister Sal are 10 and 13, camping out in the Scottish countryside, and we find out almost straight away that Sal has killed someone and these two are on the run. Dodging "the social"and "the polis", they make shift as survivors very successfully, using all the camping and hunting techniques Sal has taught herself from videos on YouTube. In their isolation they meet another wonderful character, an elderly German doctor called Ingrid who has also decided, like a witch, to live in the woods. Narrated by Sal herself, this story is all too distressingly familiar: the alcoholic mother, the adolescent daughter, the mother's sexually abusive boyfriend and his threats to "start on" the younger sister. Sal is bright but not neurotypical, which makes her a disconcerting but loveable narrator, and her voice is wholly convincing even when recounting the most violent events.