Alec Sillifant
CHAOS UNLEASHED
'...this is a powerful debut novel...' John Lloyd, The Bookbag.
A 'Love Reading 4 Kids' book of the year 2009.
'...a book long adrenaline ride that should easily hold any tween (and many adult) readers attention and leave them asking for more Jake and Angel.' IvyD for Manic Readers.
'...suspense, fear and malice come through in the readable style of this well constructed first novel...' The School Librarian.
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'...reveals both a flair for action and humour...' Armadillo Magazine.
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Of course all these reviewers said more than those bits up there that I've lifted from them but you can't shoot me for highlighting the positives...can you?
This book took me an absolute age to write and when I had written it, my publisher wanted a massive re-write; so I had to write it again. (The original story is a country mile away from this final result; maybe I'll spill the beans one day. I've probably still got a copy of it kicking about somewhere.)
Apart from being pretty hard work, it was also at the same time fun and I think it turned out pretty well and most reviewers agree with me to some extent. We'll ignore the ones that are totally wrong.
The cover you see on the left there, is the new one; the original one (there's picture of it down below) caused a little confusion, as the book was always getting credited as being written by 'Jake Highfield', the main character's name. So my massive ego took action and I had his name erased from history for all time. We artists are such delicate flowers.
This book did okay, though. It was in 'The Times' Boys Pack', one of a trio of books recommended by the editor , Alyson Rudd. It was shortlisted to be one of the books distributed to schools in the UK by 'Book Trust', a brilliant organisation. It was even almost made into a film by Danny Boyle...okay, that last one was a lie that lived only in my head. And, just for the record, it pre-dates 'Kingsman' for the old delinquent recruitment thing...not that I'm bitter.
Anyway, it's still out there, so if you want to see if the reviewers were right, why not enrol on a course at The Academy?
