Mini Book Review – Thief!

Yesterday I finished Thief! by Malorie Blackman, and it was pretty good. Thief follows Lydia Henson, a new girl at school in a new town, who has been accused of a crime she didn’t commit; and things just get worse from there; as all of a sudden she is thrown over 30 years into a bleak future. Whilst the book claims on the blurb that the story jumps into the future, it does actually take a while to get there; the build-up to it though is dark and rather menacing as it paints a portrait of how cruel the real world is, especially at a school level. The story is pretty quick and it doesn’t hang around when there is no need to, but the ending does feel a little rushed and in places a bit ridiculous as it tries not to wrap up the story, but to hang a round a little. The ending does fall into some of the rather ridiculous cliché’s of modern school fictional bullying stories with the idea that bullies don’t get a true punishment as they are somehow ‘connected!’ Despite that though the stories ending is somewhat satisfying as it does bring it all to a good conclusion. Overall, not too bad.