Forbidden Friends

Anne-Marie Conway's Forbidden Friends is a gripping summer mystery for 11 year olds about two girls on holiday in Spain, and the family secret that sits between them.

What happens

Bee has just survived her first year at Glendale High, where Melissa Knight and her friends have made her life a misery. She hasn't told anyone. Then a letter in a pink envelope arrives for her mum, her parents row for days, and her dad disappears. A policeman comes round to ask questions. When Dad finally rings, all anyone will tell Bee is that she, Mum and Nan are going to Spain.

Lizzie is nearly thirteen. She's been taught at home by her strict, short-tempered dad since she was little, and she's desperate to go to a real school. Every summer the family goes back to the same hotel in Spain, around the anniversary of her big brother Luke's death. He died when she was only three.

The two girls first cross paths by the baggage carousel at the airport, with identical suitcases. Meanwhile the grown-ups are acting very strangely. Why is Bee's mum so frightened of this trip? And why does a message waiting at the hotel desk fluster Lizzie's mum so much?

The chapters swap between Bee and Lizzie, so you're right inside both their heads. Bee is quiet and bookish and loves writing poems. Lizzie is angry and funny and fed up of living in the shadow of a brother she can't even remember. You really feel for both of them, and you'll probably want to know the secret as badly as they do.

This one is heavier than a usual holiday story, so here's what to expect. Luke's death happened years ago, but his photos are on every wall and his parents' grief fills the house. Lizzie's dad shouts and looks at her with "ice-cold eyes". Bee is being bullied at school. None of it is graphic in the opening chapters, but a child who finds family tension or loss hard to read about might want to know first. For a reader who loves a secret slowly coming to the surface, it's a real page-turner.

What to read next

If they're after another summer of friendship and family mysteries, try Butterfly Summer, also by Anne-Marie Conway. Becky moves to a gloomy old house in the country, finds an old photo under her mum's bed, and makes a wild new friend in the Butterfly Garden.