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Joy Court - Editorial Expert
Joy Court is Reviews Editor for The School Librarian journal and Past Chair of the CILIP Carnegie and Kate Greenaway Medals.
Previously she managed the Schools Library Service in Coventry where she established the Coventry Inspiration Book Awards and the Literally Coventry Book Festival, but now just concentrates on books and libraries as a freelance consultant. She has chaired and spoken on panels at festivals and conferences around the UK. She is also a Trustee and member of the National Council of the United Kingdom Literacy Association where she sits on the selection panel for the UKLA Book Awards and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts and of The English Association.
Author of Read to Succeed: strategies to engage children and young people in reading for pleasure (2011) and Reading By Right: successful strategies to ensure every child can read to succeed (2017) FACET and author of several Riveting Reads annotated booklists for the School Library Association, most recently, with Daniel Hahn, Riveting Reads- a world of books in translation (2017)
Latest Reviews By Joy Court
Jenny Downham is one of our foremost writers for young adults, winning national and international awards with her extraordinary debut, Before I Die, also becoming an Hollywood blockbuster, and now she here she is with another debut! This time as a coauthor for the first time with a novel which began as a lockdown writing challenge with her actor and playwright son, Louis Hill.
Together they have written an unforgettable and deeply moving novel about siblings Leah and Charlie, with each taking on one of the narrative voices. Both are trying to cope, in their very different ways, with ... View Full Review
A page turning twisty thriller is exactly what you would expect from the best-selling crime novelist Sarah J Harris, here writing under a pseudonym, and this novel delivers that in spades.
The four diverse teenage protagonists have nothing in common except that each has a reason, albeit some quite petty, for needing money. They find themselves the four survivors of a fatal school bus clifftop crash, reminiscent of the famous last scene of The Italian Job, with a bag full of cash and a gun.
They decide that they will split the money and then all they need to ... View Full Review
From the author of Four Good Liars, we have another gripping psychological thriller. Narrated by Grace, who has been uprooted from her life in London ‘ for her own good’. A ‘fresh start’ in rural Devon is what her dad is seeking for them both after an unspecified trauma involving Grace. Accompanying them is the adorable Shelby, an equally traumatised dog, passionately devoted to Grace, as she is to him.
It is apparent that Grace’s mental health is not good and on one of her sleepless nights, the smart speaker in the kitchen ... View Full Review
Another powerful and hugely enjoyable feminist retelling of a traditional fairytale, following on the success of Poisoned and Stepsister which reworked Snow White and Cinderella respectively. Here Jennifer Donnelly turns her modern gaze upon Beauty and The Beast and encompasses a gender swap in the process, which enables her to explore themes like societal expectations, stereotypical gender roles and self-acceptance.
The original tale is thought by some scholars to have originated in 18th Century France as a cautionary tale to prepare young women for marriage to ‘beastly’ older men, as was so often the ... View Full Review
With possibly one of my favourite titles of the year, this dual narrative romantic comedy written by two highly acclaimed YA novelists, manages to not only be an excellent example of the enemies to lovers trope, but also creates an authentic insight into a vibrant Muslim community and to deal with some powerful topics such as grief, anti-Black racism within the Muslim community, and the potential conflict between fulfilling personal dreams and family expectations.
Growing up, Said Hossain and Tiwa Olatunji were inseparable, but they have barely spoken since The Incident many Eids ago. But when Said comes home for ... View Full Review
A new YA novel from Jenny Valentine is always something to celebrate. She writes with beautiful economy, there is never a wasted word, and her books will always leave an indelible impression upon the reader and will have them thinking deeply about what they have just experienced.
This is a mesmerising story about friendship, love, loss and grief. Elk and Mab are sixteen, on the cusp of independence, with everything ahead of them. They met at age eleven and have been inseparable ever since. They have the sort of friendship that everyone dreams of. In an instant, a tragic accident ... View Full Review
This book from the bestselling author of the S.T.A.G.S series, is an absolute gift to English teachers and to literature students studying Gothic novels. It takes core elements from the classic set texts and weaves them into a thoroughly modern and enjoyable metatextual analysis of the horror genre across all media.
We have four intriguing young people, telling their own stories in wonderfully crafted unique voices, giving subtly different perspectives on the unfolding horror story. They withhold secrets from each other, but not from the reader, who gets the full impact of the building tension ... View Full Review
Every new novel from the Carnegie Medal winning author and past Laureate na nÓg is a highly anticipated event and fans will certainly not find themselves disappointed by this outstanding offering.
Set in 1846 as the potato famine swept across Ireland, it introduces us to Nell, the eldest daughter of a family that are tenants on the estate of Lord Wicken, a wealthy English aristocrat. She has been forced to give up her studies and start work as a scullery maid in his home to keep her family from starvation.
It is here she meets John Browning, the nephew ... View Full Review
This complex and twisty thriller has real psychological and emotional depth, with very authentic, relatable characters who simply leap off the page. Vividly voiced by Jo, a high school student, ostracized and slut shamed after stolen private photos of her are leaked to her classmates, she is unable to focus on schoolwork, consequently on academic probation and her parents completely fail to see her struggles.
What starts as an investigation into the disappearance of her one-time best friend Maddie, becomes a determination to reveal some much darker conspiracies and secrets and in the process to come to recognise what had ... View Full Review
The second novel from this Branford Boase shortlisted author certainly lives up to the promise of his debut Grow.
Apart from the deliberately anonymous first page, the story is narrated by three voices: Matt, Mark and Luc. Each voice is unique and distinctive and they vividly describe the lives of four young boys growing up in a small town in England, negotiating friendship, school and family and each desperate to get out and find freedom. They play games, scoring points off each other, anything to break the boredom. But Mark gets involved in a very dangerous game and his ... View Full Review
Set in the author’s hometown of Coatbridge, this hard hitting, shockingly authentic and unforgettable novel will sadly be all too relevant to far too many other places where poverty, gang violence and substance abuse are rife. He is shining a light on overlooked and ignored communities and the metaphor of the title is poignantly apt for the young people who can see no way out and no future.
It opens with a funeral and ends with one, young lives brutally and needlessly cut short. Our narrator is Con, a young man who is no stranger to death, his ... View Full Review
The fourteenth book from this bestselling childcare and parenting expert is designed to be provocative. She wants the reader to re-examine their own childhood, as well as their parenting experience and to look more widely at how our society treats children.
It is an altogether fascinating blend of history, anthropology, sociology, psychology, and current affairs, written in an accessible, chatty, myth-busting style, but with each chapter fully backed up by references. As a mother of four, like the author, I found myself forcefully agreeing as I was reading about the potential harm caused by so called sleep training and historical ... View Full Review
