Ignore the blob of red in the top left corner. It's jam, not blood, though I don't think I need to tell you the difference. It wasn't your wife's jam the police found on your shoe. . . .
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5 of 5 people found the following review helpful.
interesting premise
By T. Lam
One thing I can say for Ketchup Clouds is that it's definitely a unique read and I can't think of another book quite like it. Ketchup Clouds is told from the point of view of Zoe (an alias), a teenager suffering from debilitating guilt. From what, we're not exactly sure. Zoe decides to share her story with a death row prison inmate in order to assuage her guilt and share her secret with someone. Zoe relates to the inmate because, in her mind, she's killed someone as well. Through Zoe's letters, the reader learns about the events leading up to the fateful day that would change Zoe's life forever and leave one young man dead.I don't read many epistolary novels (novels written through documents, like letters and diary entries). I think it's really hard to do well. Zoe's letters read more like diary entries and I think the book would have worked better for me if that's what they were. Instead, the letters feel awkward and gimmick-y. It also bothered me that Zoe took such a long time to tell her story. She confesses a burning desire to share her tale, and then takes months to do it, even as the inmate's execution draws near.Zoe starts writing to this inmate because she says can relate to his crimes. However, after hearing her whole story, I found it hard to believe that she would identify so much with a man who murdered his wife and her lover after he caught them cheating. Zoe feels like she murdered someone but the situations were so different it was hard for me to believe she'd relate so much, though I guess it just shows how guilty Zoe feels.Zoe is an interesting character though not one that I can say I really like. She really likes one brother but starts going out with another because he happens to be available. While I don't expect every character to be a paradigm of good human behavior, I found Zoe's actions to be very selfish and immature. She's acting like a normal teenager but there was just something about it that rubbed me the wrong way. She did win a few points with me though with her relationship to her sister. She was very protective of her and their relationship was very sweet.As for the romance in the story, I definitely fell on the Team Aaron side. It was clear to me that Zoe and Aaron had so much more in common and more chemistry than Zoe and Max. I think that's why I was so annoyed that she kept things going with Max because she and Aaron seemed to have a much deeper connection.This book was really a mixed bag for me. The overall premise is original but the execution was not quite there and it fell short of my expectations. It's still a worthwhile read just because it is very unique point of view and the identity of which brother died left me guessing until the very end. No doubt this book will find fans, but it just wasn't for me.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful.
Superb!!
By Lincs Reader
When Annabel Pitcher's debut novel My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece was published in March last year she really raised the bar for authors of young adult novels and set herself a very very high standard to keep. The novel was shortlisted for numerous awards and was praised by other authors, by the press and by book bloggers.I was very excited to receive a pre-publication copy of her second novel Ketchup Clouds which will be published by Indigo (an imprint of Orion) at the end of the year.Ketchup Clouds is certainly not a copy of My Sister, but it got the same reaction from me and I loved every page, I was hooked in by the end of the first paragraph and was loathe to put it down at all until I'd finished the last sentence.The lead character; Zoe, has done something wrong, or so she thinks. She has lived with what has happened to her for the past year, feeling guilty, yet hiding her feelings at the same time. Zoe's family have their own problems and she doesn't want to burden them any more. Mum and Dad are constantly bickering, about money, about jobs, about Grandpa, it seems to Zoe that they argue about everything these days. Her sister Soph is ten years old and struggles to find her place in the family, and then there is the baby of the family; little Dot. Dot is deaf, yet funny and happy but Mum does seem to spend so much more time with her than either of the others.When a Nun visits Zoe's school to talk about capital punishment and tells them about prisoners on Death Row in the USA, Zoe becomes intrigued. It is there, in the most unlikely place, that Zoe finds someone she can confide in. Stu Harris, convicted murderer, facing the death sentence. Zoe creeps out into the garden shed night after night and writes letter after letter to Stu, spilling her secrets and her innermost thoughts honestly and candidly.Annabel Pitcher creates a wonderfully lifelike and credible teenage voice in Zoe, allowing the reader to find out slowly and surely just what has happened to her over the past year. The family rows, the teenage angst, the blossoming relationships with boys, the responsibilities of being the older sibling, but at the same time she doesn't give much away. The sense of intrigue and the feeling of suspense builds up right up until the last few chapters when finally all is revealed to the reader.There are only a very few authors of young adult fiction that can really engage me as an adult reader, who can write novels that seem as relevant to an adult as they do to teenagers. Tabitha Suzuma and the late Siobhan Dowd are two of the best, and Annabel Pitcher is now firmly up there with them in my eyes.Ketchup Clouds is a compelling, sometimes funny, often heartbreaking and always original story of a young girl's guilt and fear, it's also a story of new beginnings and hope. The characters become real, the writing is engaging and very very special.Fans of My Sister Lives on the Mantelpiece can breathe a sigh of relief, Annabel Pitcher has produced another sure fire winner.
3 of 3 people found the following review helpful.
A mom's review: suspenseful and original
By Jennifer Donovan
If you look at the cover you might imagine that this is a lighthearted young adult read with the requisite teen love triangle and maybe some angst. Well, there’s a love triangle, and there’s some angst, but it’s not over a botched dye job or a back-stabbing best friend. No, Zoe is writing letters to a death row inmate who is set to be put to death on May 1 for killing his wife. Zoe begins by telling him she knows how she feels, because on the previous May 1, she killed someone she loved too. Stuart Harris is paying the price for his crime, but Zoe has to deal with the fact no one knows.The entire story is told in the form of letters she writes to him late late at night in secret, starting in August, 9 months after the event occurred. She shares information about her present life as well as going back to tell the story of what led up to the events of May 1.The story was told in such a way that we don’t know what happened and why — and not even to whom! — until much later. It unfolds naturally. It was suspenseful but not stilted. Zoe is a great character. I wanted to know about the past and about her current life, and I loved hearing it from her perspective.Ketchup Clouds is a typical YA story in some ways featuring a great teen character, but it’s told in such a unique way and with such skilled restraint, that it really stands out in my mind.CONTENT NOTE: Young Adult fiction spans a gamut, so I like to include notes on content so that you can avoid surprises. There’s a fair amount of sexual content (between PG-13 and R), and not much language that I remember.
