Unfadeable

Maurice Broaddus's Unfadeable is a gutsy neighbourhood story for 9 year olds about a young graffiti artist who won't let the grown-ups ignore her.

What happens

Bella Fades is thirteen and signs her walls "UNFADEABLE" in red and green. School's out, and she's getting by alone in the neighbourhood everyone calls The Land. Her dad left years ago and her mum isn't around. Bella's secret is that she's sleeping in an empty artist's house, and she's terrified someone will call Child Services.

So she's supposed to be keeping her head down. Then she goes to a neighbourhood meeting (mostly for the snacks, which turn out not to exist) and asks about painting a community mural. The chair bangs her gavel and shuts her down. Then she announces that a hundred thousand dollars has already gone on a park Bella has never seen.

Bella smells a rat. And that's her summer sorted.

Her voice is the best thing about it. She's sharp and funny and very quick to size people up. A police officer has a moustache like "squirrel fur", and the chair gets called a raisin-faced Santa. But underneath all that sass is a girl who's lonely and hungry and doing sums about how to survive each day. She calls people "associates" because friends are a risk she can't afford.

Slowly, though, people start to find her. There's Ms Campbell with her Popsicles and her cats, a big lad called Aaries who seems to know exactly who she is, and a mysterious old man called M with a room full of screens.

Some of it is heavy for this shelf. Bella is thirteen, and it reads a little older. Her mum has spent time in what Bella calls a "brain hospital", and Bella has had to look after herself. There are drug dealers, a crime family and older boys on bikes working as lookouts. One painted door shows police officers dumping bodies into graves.

For a reader who's ready for that, it's a warm, big-hearted story about community and standing up to people in charge. Would your reader stand up at a meeting full of adults? Bella does, and she doesn't back down.

What to read next

If they love a girl carrying grown-up worries who fights for the people around her, try Kelly Yang's Front Desk. Mia's family have lived in their car, and a job running a motel looks like their big chance.