The Star Outside My Window

In short, this novel is simple yet touching story which follows four young protagonists as they try and get to Royal Observatory in London to name a star.

Onjali Q. Raúf is like the Jodi Picoult of the kids' world. She does an incredible job of tackling tricky issues in a way that kids can easily access. In this book, she looks at the impact of domestic violence and children being put into the foster system. At the end of the novel, an author's note tells the reader about Raúf's personal experience with this: she had an aunt who was killed by her husband. As a result, Raúf has set up a women's rights organisation called Making Herstory. And wrote this book, obviously.

If I'm totally honest, I didn't enjoy this quite as much as The Boy at the Back of the Class. Despite the different context, the plot seemed fairly similar, with a young girl travelling into London with a group of friends to try and talk to ‘people in charge'.

I also feel like things wrap up just a bit too neatly in her books. I understand that they're for children, but the fact that the people in charge always give the main character exactly what they want seems like it's going to give kids an unrealistic view of the way the world works.

Despite this, I enjoyed the book and will definitely take to school as I think my class will love it. 3.75/5