The House on the Edge by Alex Cotter

Faith’s got a few problems. Sea ghosts in the cellar. A house on a crumbling cliff. A father lost at sea and a mother sunk in woe. Not to mention the school’s started to sniff around, and no one’s done the washing up for ages.

Faith’s trying to hold it all together, but that crack in the garden is matched by the one in her mind and it’s all getting rather a lot for a girl to handle, especially one who is isolated from her best friend and drowning in worry.

The question is: what can crack the wall she’s built around herself?

There are lots of literary goosebumps in this middlegrade novel: treasure tales, ghost sightings, secret tunnels, mysterious disappearances, old maps, beach-combing strangers, and legends of wreckers and terrible plunder.

It sounds historic or gothic, but the narrative is disarmingly modern with references to social media, breakfast brands, TV programmes, and films. For me, the modern gleam slightly undermined the good old-fashioned elements, and though Faith’s choppy sentences mirror the crumbling terrain, I had to reread several to decipher her sequencing of events.

I love the term sea-ghost, though! And the exciting finale kept me reading late. Faith shows true mettle at the end.

WHAT TO READ NEXT:

If you fancy more crumbling coasts, try Kat Wolfe Takes the Case by Lauren St John