My especially weird week with Tess

Anna Woltz, My especially weird week with Tess, Bloomsbury Publishing Australia, August 2023, 176 pp., RRP $17.99 (pbk), ISBN 9780861542987

This enjoyable middle-grade novel is set on the island of Texel on the US/Canadian border. Sam is on holiday with his family and while exploring the island by bike, he runs into the effervescent Tess. He soon becomes embroiled in Tess’s crazy plan to meet the father who doesn’t know she exists.

The story progresses at a cracking pace as Sam is caught up in Tess’s schemes. The first step in her plan is to lure her father, Hugo, to the island. She makes contact to inform him that he’s ‘won’ a holiday with free accommodation in the rental that her mother lets out over summer. Tess and Sam wind up playing host to Hugo and his girlfriend, Elise.

The whole situation is complicated by Tess’s mother’s insistence that the pair of them are a self-contained family and no woman ever needed anything from a man. Neither of Tess’s parents realise the other is on the island and Tess doesn’t reveal her identity to Hugo either. This giant secret that the children (and the reader) know but the adults don’t, serves to heighten the tension and makes for an incredibly fun read.

The book maintains a light tone while covering themes of family and death. At one point, Sam tries to prepare himself as the youngest member of his family for life without them. He ventures off on his own each day, practicing the loneliness that will be his lot when he’s the only survivor. Luckily, someone wiser and older eventually points out the folly of this plan.

Highly recommended for readers 8-plus.

Reviewed by Heather Gallagher

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