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    My Brother's Shadow
    My Brother's Shadow
    My Brother's Shadow
    Ebook108 pages1 hour

    My Brother's Shadow

    By Tom Avery and Kate McKendrick Grove

    4.5/5

    ()

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    About this ebook

    My name is Kaia.
    I’m frozen because of what happened.
    I’m trapped because of what I saw.
    Can someone help me to grow again?

    Kaia is frozen when her brother dies, but can an unexpected friend help her to grow again?

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherAndersen Digital
    Release dateNov 28, 2014
    ISBN9781448187775
    My Brother's Shadow
    Author

    Tom Avery

    Tom Avery is one of the brightest stars among the new generation of young explorers. As one of only forty-one people in history to have reached both the North and South Poles on foot and a veteran of over a dozen mountain and polar expeditions, Tom holds several exploration world records and is listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for leading “the fastest surface journey to the North Pole.” He lives in Wimbledon, England.

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    Reviews for My Brother's Shadow

    4.5/5

    11 ratings2 reviews

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    • 4/5
      I did like this story for a few reasons. The first reason I liked the story is that it forced the reader to broaden their perspectives. Having the story be about a sister who loses her brother to suicide is something that not everyone will have to endure in their life, so it is able to show a new perspective. I know personally, this is something I have not endured in my life, so this was all new information for me. I can understand that this story would be difficult for some readers to read because the topic does become very deep at certain points. Readers might feel uncomfortable reading the details about the suicide, this is also able to push readers to think about the difficult situation. Having readers be enlightened about this difficult situation will also help them to be more compassionate to people who are enduring similar situations. During multiple sections of the book Kaia is called a freak for how she acting after her brother’s death, but this only makes her situation worse. Having readers witness this will allow them to not repeat the same mistakes. Another reason I liked the story was because I thought the main character, Kaia, is believable. Throughout the story Kaia describes herself as being frozen. She is frozen in her life and is unable to move on from the loss of her brother. I think this is a very relatable term for people who have lost someone close to them. It is often hard to move on after losing such a big part of your life. Having a character that is relatable to readers allow to see themselves in the story and become more engaged in the story. Another thing that I liked about the story was the engaging plot. The story had a character “the wild boy” who was described as never speaking, and his only communication was through his grey eyes. This character was able to add a lot of suspense to the story. The boy always did what he wanted, even when it was not socially acceptable. He would yell, and jump around, and this keeps readers always wondering what he would do next. Having an engaging plot keeps readers wanting to continue with the story to see what is going to happen next. A last reason I liked the story was because I thought the language was patterned. It often repeated phrases throughout the story, and this helped to emphasize important phrases in the story. This also helped to emphasize the emotions in the text. When Kaia appeared to be feeling overwhelmed Kaia would then repeat phrases, which is what I find myself doing sometimes in my head when I feel overwhelmed too. This was an added touch to the story that helped to give the text its own character. I believe the overall big picture of the story is that it is okay to take time to overcome loses. Kaia could not rush getting over the death of her brother, but she did not have to. It was good that she took her time and was able to deal with everything on her own terms.
    • 5/5
      Quite simply, a stunning book of a young girl alone, as her mother cannot help Kaia as alons, she grieves the loss of her brother.

      She found him, now she must find the way out of the powerful hold of grief. Previously, a honor student, now she slips rapidly into sadness that cannot allow her to find a way back.

      A boy appears outside the school window. When he arrives inside, he jumps on the desks, howls like a wild animal and refuses to behave. He sticks by Kaia, never saying words, simply sitting by her.

      The mother who cannot stop drinking her way through the sadness cannot help her, but this wild boy seems to take her mind off the tragic loss.

      This is a wonderful tale of loss and grief and trying as best as possible to climb out of the deep well of sadness.

      Excellent.

      Five Stars!

    Book preview

    My Brother's Shadow - Tom Avery

    Arrival

    It was winter when he arrived. The chill wind blew through his ragged clothes, turning his skin a raw pink. Chapped lips and bloodied gums, his face pressed against the window.

    When I saw him that first time I screamed – a small and silent scream, all inside, in my gut. It was the most terrifying, the most thrilling, the strangest thing to happen in a maths lesson in a long time.

    The boy dipped below the frame like a duck. He soon resurfaced.

    His eyes – a sharp, cold grey – searched the classroom, passing from face to face. I stared right back.

    When his eyes met mine through the frosted glass, and my heart was stilled in my chest, I thought perhaps, for just a moment, a flickering smile parted those cracked lips.

    Smiles can be small, tiny even, minute. Smiles can be just in your eyes. Magic, secret smiles that you don’t want anyone to see but you can’t help. Or magic, secret smiles that you want just one person to see – the one person that you love the most, who knows your face the best.

    Later, even when I knew that face, after hours and hours of staring at that furrowed brow and thick, charcoal eyebrows, hours of afternoons shared, I still wasn’t sure if in that first glance there’d been a smile.

    That face was the biggest mystery of all.

    Frozen Girl

    Last term Mr Wills gave us each a yellow notebook filled with empty, grey pages.

    ‘This is your holiday homework,’ he said. ‘You’re to write a diary of everything you do over the break.’

    I didn’t write anything. Well, what was I going to write?

    Monday:

    Mum went to work. I was meant to be going to the holiday club at school. Instead I made a sandwich, went to the big park and sat under an oak tree. (Quercus robur)

    Tuesday:

    Mum was ‘sick’ and didn’t go to work. Heard her boss shouting at her down the phone. Think Mum’s lost her job.

    My mum from before would never have acted this way. My mum from before loved her job. My mum from before loved me.

    I made a sandwich, went to the park and sat under a different tree, silver birch today. (Betula pendula – the best name of any tree.)

    Wednesday:

    Mum ‘sicker’. I stayed at home so she didn’t hurt herself. Hoped she didn’t hurt me.

    No, I didn’t write anything. But then the boy appeared. So I decided to fill these empty pages. I had something in my life to write about and someone in my life to write about.

    I think they tried to take the boy away. The police probably, social workers, the teachers. They all tried to get him to leave. He screamed and barked, yelled and growled. I heard him from the classroom, where I shivered and glanced at the window. Mr Wills set us reading to do.

    I used to love books – each one a mystery waiting to be uncovered.

    Long, long ago, back when no one called me idiot or freak, I used to read books just like the other girls. Now they read big fat books with thousands and thousands of words, big fat books with big fat mysteries and pretty pink covers. I still read the same books, the same books as a year ago when I was ten, when everything stopped, not just my reading.

    I’m frozen in the past. I’m frozen in a day which I’ll never forget. Frozen. Frozen. Frozen. How do you defrost yourself from something you cannot see? How can you change what’s happened?

    I Kaia am forever frozen.

    Forever frozen Kaia I am.

    I forever Kaia am frozen.

    So I’m not reading. I don’t want to remember. Instead I’m writing this.

    In the end, I don’t think they could make the boy go. His wails and wild shouts must have stopped the whole school from working, so they let him stay.

    At the end of the day when Mr Wills had given us our homework – yes, more homework – and we’d finished our daily scramble for bags and coats and empty lunchboxes, we lined up as usual outside the library. And there he was, perched like a blackbird, his knees pulled up to his chest and his toes curled around the lip of a chair amongst the bookshelves.

    He stared at us again. Dev and his stupid mates made stupid jokes about his dirty, raggedy clothes.

    ‘They’re definitely from Oxfam, bruv,’ Dev said.

    Poppy, Hanaiya and all the other girls giggled. I stared right back at the boy.

    It’s rude to stare. That’s what I’ve been told. But I don’t know why, sometimes it’s not. We’re told to keep our eyes on our writing and focus on those maths problems. When I gaze at the sky or lose myself looking up through the branches of trees trying to see some pattern or order, no one tells me off. But if I stare at a person, an amazing, unique, miraculous person, I’m being rude.

    We should be allowed to stare at everybody. We should be made to stare at everybody. All these incredible people and we’re not allowed to stare. It’s madness.

    Have you seen them all? Well, I know you’ve seen them, but have you seen them? Scurrying here, busying there, all thinking different things, dreaming different dreams, with a different past and a different future, every single stupendous one of them.

    It’s good to stare: that should be the rule. That’s the kind of rule Moses made for me, when I was sad or worried or sick.

    ‘Tears let the sadness out,’ he said.

    Or, ‘The future is full of possibilities.’

    Or, ‘Everyone’s gotta be sick some day.’

    That’s what he said – before. Rules for life, he called them.

    It’s good to stare.

    So I stared right back. The boy stared. I stared. He stared. I stared. He stared. I stared.

    ‘Come on!’ Mr Wills called. Everyone else had gone. It was just me, staring.

    Someone in the library – who hadn’t been as interesting as the boy – closed the door, and

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