TOBY ALONE BY TIMOTHEE DE FOMBELLE

Toby Alone is a novel about a 13-year-old boy on the run from the law. The thing is, he's one and a half millimetres tall and lives in a tree.

When the novel opens the reader has no idea why Toby is on the run, but as the book progresses, through a series of flashbacks it is revealed why Toby is running. More and more information about Toby's childhood is also revealed, and characters are introduced both in the flashbacks and the story of Toby running.

The book was clever in it's descriptions of the tree and the author has created a whole world in the Tree. But there were so many characters I found it hard to keep track of them all, and so many of them were evil that I just got the bad guys all mixed up.

Toby's friend Elisha is one of the more interesting characters, as are his parents. There is a strong environmental/conservation theme in the book which both adds and detracts to the story - for older readers this adds interest but it could easily bore younger readers.

Overall the book was a good story but I thought it had too many characters and the plot was overly-complicated. I'm still really trying to figure out some aspects of it.

Butterflies: 6 out of 10

Recommended for: children over 11

Warnings: references to violence and death but nothing much really!

(apologies for lack of cover, I will upload it later but right now blogger is not letting me!)