I am using this book as the basis for a unit of work on placement and very excited to see how the children's work turns out.

This book was the winner of the Branford Boase Award 2001 and marked the start of author Marcus Sedgwick's multi-award-winning career.I didn’t really believe in the characters or their dynamics and relationships and felt the ending was rather cliched. The doom that prevails is beautifully crafted as is the glimmer of hope that pulls us through the book with its magnetism.

The main character was a very head strong, independent girl named Zoe who overcame many problems with mostly no adult figures to guide her. Floodland is an extraordinary novel, set some time in the not too distant future in a land that has been reclaimed by the sea. My biggest complaint about FLOODLAND is that it is too short and as a result it suffered from not being able to give enough information to the reader to totally be at ease with what was going on. The ending is quite abrupt and we would have liked it to be a bit longer but that is only because we were disappointed when it was finished. The belief that she will one day find her parents spurs Zoe on to a dramatic escape in a story of courage and determination that is handled with warmth and humanity.If it was that tragedy brings out the worst in humans then it did a good job but it didn't go deep enough. Despite its bleakness the story itself is very good and has a very believable plot it’s just that Zoe is all over the place as far as her character goes and on top of that it seems like the story starts and ends in the middle. I encourage readers to start exploring the climate fiction genre more, but not necessarily with this title. Unfortunately, despite glaring allusions to "Lord of the Flies" and a couple of mystical references à la William Blake, the whole fails to equal the sum of its parts.

Put this together with the feral survival of the children on the Island of Eels and you have Floodland. Of his story, Sedgwick says, "This was one of those stories that I thought might be a novel originally but actually was much better suited to the tight form of the short story. The Raven Mysteries are full of humour and mad-cap action, which is quite different from your novels for older readers. I did feel that the ending was a little rushed and as though the part that the story built up to was missing a great amount of detail but over all myself and the class thoroughly enjoyed the book.She lives in decaying warehouses on the edge of the waters, foraging for old tinned foods and collecting rainwater to drink. His first book, Floodland, was published by Orion in 2000, and won the Branford-Boase award for best debut children's novel. He has published novels such as Floodland (winner of the Branford Boase Award in 2001) and The Dark Horse (shortlisted for The Guardian Children's Book Award 2002). Ten-year-old Zoe discovers a small rowboat and keeps it a secret until she sets out alone on the great sea to find her parents.

If it was to make people aware of the dangers of global warming it didn't touch on what had actually happened to bring about this world with any clarity. Along the way she ends up at another Island where she gets herself into a tricky situation and well I won't spoil any more. p.81) Even though it's really short, and offers no real explanation for the sea-level rise, I really liked how this drops the reader into its world. I love Marcus Sedgwick and his writing style and this being his debut novel was clearly a stepping stone for his future work to come. saw Marcus turn his attention to books for younger readers with the launch of a humorous new series: The Raven Mysteries, narrated by a grumpy raven, Edgar.She finds her way to Eel Island, a place where mobs rule in a bid for survival in a dark, dank graveyard of a world. I've given it three stars rather than two though because the author wasn't to blame for the publisher's failure, while the story displays clear potential.