Saturday, March 24, 2012

BOOK: Flip by Martyn Bedford

Flip by Martyn Bedford, 258 pages

Random Reading Challenge: Young Adult

Imagine waking up in another body. It's your brain (or soul or essence, all of which is discussed in the book) but someone else's body. Fourteen year old Alex wakes up in Philip (Flip's) body. Flip is everything that Alex isn't - athletic, has girlfriends, and lots of money, but that doesn't make Alex want to be Flip! Six months later, in a new town in northern England, Alex is mightily confused. Like being a teenager isn't hard enough!

What I liked here was the gradual discovery of what happened - it seemed possible to me, and not weirdly otherworldly. Alex was a rather old fourteen. He seemed more like sixteen, which isn't a huge difference, but enough to be spending so much time on his own, figuring things out, and drinking beer. It was very readable, and I couldn't put it down, wanting to find out what happened, and how it might be resolved.

I've passed this on to my daughter to read.