Bone Jack

Written by Sara Crowe

Narrated by Gareth Bennett-Ryan

Ash Tyler knows that times have been tough in his area of northern England. There has been drought, and the sheep that didn't die from disease were killed by government officials trying to prevent the disease from spreading. His father returns from war physically unharmed, but carrying emotional and psychological scars. Even Ash's best friend, Mark, isn't acting like himself. Ash feels more disconnected from his loved ones than ever. All he wants is for everything to go back to how it used to be. As Ash trains to run in the Stag Chase-a race rooted in violent, ancient lore-he's certain that if he can just win the race and make his father proud, life will return to normal. But the line between reality and magic, between the living world and the dead, is rapidly blurring, and the past has a way of threatening the present. Ash's friend Mark is on a quest to bring his late father back from the dead in a ritual that now threatens Ash. When a run in the mountains brings Ash face to face with Bone Jack-a figure with the ability to take different natural forms-everything changes once more. Bone Jack guards the boundary between the living world and the dead, and he's reappeared after centuries of dormancy, summoned by the dark energy taking root. As Ash tries to sort out why the very fabric of his world-and the people in it-are falling apart, it becomes harder to distinguish reality from illusion. Ash must literally run for his life if he is ever to help his friend, save himself, and restore things to their proper order. For fans of Neil Gaiman's THE GRAVEYARD BOOK, a haunting story for older middle-grade readers.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Recorded Books, Inc.
• Release date: Aug 4, 2017
• ISBN: 9781501965555

Sara Crowe

Sara Crowe was born in a tiny cottage in Cornwall and raised in the wilds of Devon, Lincolnshire, Yorkshire and several other English counties. She has worked as a part-time shepherd, a model (the clothed variety) and a film extra. She has a PhD from Bristol University and has taught courses on early cinema and the history of photography. In 2013, she went on a year-long journey around Britain in a motorhome, photographing and writing about nature, local folklore and the landscape as she goes.Her first novel was Bone Jack.

Reviews for Bone Jack

[sweetkokoro-61371 · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

If you are located in the US please PLEASE do yourself a favor and listen to the audiobook version of this book, because the US publishers trashed this book by downgrading it from YA to Middle Grade.

The book is originally a UK YA book and the audiobook is based on that version and holy smokes is it soooo much better then what the US did to it.
Chunks of the story were completely removed to make it kid friendly.
This story gets dark, 15/16 year old boys threatening to murder each other, suicide, an army dad who suffers from PTSD, so many heavy harsh elements that are severely downplayed or completely removed from the US version.

Each chapter just got increasingly darker and heavier which really helped sell the story for me, I’m so use to US YA books ending is happy love stories that this was a fresh of breath air. It starts heavy and then ends heavy, aside from the supernatural aspects of the story, which were good, the story is real, and tackles real problems and issues that some people face and it doesn’t gloss it over. (unless your reading the US version)

It’s a deep story with real issues and a bit of supernatural fun to bring other elements of the story to life, it’s a heavy ride but worth it.

I just can’t understand why the US publishers felt it was necessary to downgrade it to Middlegrade and just completely hack and trash the story, it lost its whole appeal and deeper storytelling that was involved.

I constantly compared the two as I had both version from
My library, and I’m just really upset the US publishers ruined a really good book.