Infernal Devices

Philip Reeve's Infernal Devices is a big, gripping Mortal Engines adventure for 11 year olds about a teenager who's sure nothing exciting will ever happen to her.

What happens

Wren Natsworthy is fifteen. She lives in a rusty old city that stopped moving before she was born. It's dug into the shore of an island on a lost lake, and it's the quietest place in the world. Wren is bored out of her mind.

She's also just had a huge row with her mum. It started with the washing up, as these things do.

So she sneaks out at midnight. She follows the town's grumpy engineer up the hill and down to a beach, where she sees him meet a stranger. There are no strangers here. Ever.

The stranger is Gargle. He's young, charming and a Lost Boy, one of a gang of underwater burglars who get about in strange walking submarines. He gives Wren hot chocolate in his cabin (the city ran out of chocolate years ago) and asks for one small favour. Could she find him a dusty old book made of tin?

Wren has read lots of stories about plucky schoolgirl detectives. Now she's got a real secret of her own, and she loves it!

What makes this one is that you know more than Wren does. The moment she's gone, Gargle tells his crew exactly what they'll do if she tells anyone. You'll want to shout at her.

Wren is so real. She's moody, funny and quite unkind about her mum in her head. Then the book swaps over and you see her mum's side too, and it's heartbreaking. Who's right? Both of them, probably.

This one comes after Mortal Engines and Predator's Gold and gives away how both of those end. It's best read in order.

It sits right at the top of the shelf, so be ready for some dark moments. Gargle threatens to kill Wren's whole family and leave her to his partner's knife if she talks. Wren's mum shoots a deer and smears its blood on her own forehead. There's a crush on an older stranger who's lying to her. Her mum even admits that she's sometimes wished Wren had never been born. A sensitive reader might find that last one hard.

If they love a big story about family and secrets, this is a real treat.

What to read next

For another girl who grew up on an island far from anywhere, try Philip Reeve's Utterly Dark and the Face of the Deep. Utterly was washed up on the shore as a baby, and she loves the sea that all the grown-ups around her are so frightened of.