Review – Foxlight

I was lucky enough to request and receive a free copy of this. All views and opinions are my own.

Foxlight by Katya Balen, illustrated by Barry Falls, published by Bloomsbury.

This was a wonderful surprise parcel to open, and it couldn’t have arrived at a better time; Finishing Matt Goodfellow’s The Final Year (review here) recently sent me down a David Almond rabbit hole – I listened AGAIN to both Skellig and My Name is Mina, as well as The Colour of the Sun and – new to me – Heaven Eyes.

And in the midst of this dream-like spree full of wonder at the natural world, absent mothers and children on the cusp of ‘growing up’ came Foxlight, which slotted into the vibe uncannily well.

This is a book overflowing with the power of the wild and the power of words. Nature and stories and imagination woven together to create a tale of family (both blood and found); of abandonment, anger and acceptance; of self-discovery, support and stories.

Rey and Fen were found in the wilderness surrounding the Light House, where they now live with other orphans and Lissa who takes care of them.

The children all have objects, messages, letters left with them as babies anchoring them to their past. All except Rey and Fen, who have simply a charcoal drawing of a fox and the story of the foxes they were found with.

So when – after years of staring longingly, wonderingly, out at the wildlands beyond (Fen) and planting hopefully, fruitlessly, silently (Rey) – a fox comes to the Light House, they see it as a sign and follow it into the wild…

And so begins a journey across the wildlands, which are much, well, wilder than Fen has anticipated. As with Katya Balen’s previous books, this is a novel which celebrates the incredible and beautiful aspects of the natural world without letting us forget its power and harshness too.

It’s a book which highlights cleverly our role in helping nature, taking care of our world and the precarious balance tgst exists, without beating us around the head with it or labouring the point.

I loved the traces left, objects abandoned and questions posed by the rewilders who had previously tried to help the wildlands, and the way they and their story threaded into the girls’ stories and skills and selves too.

Desperately following the fox and a small, found map (absolutely loved the different shelters and their secret spots on the cover were a delight to find too!) the sisters start off looking for their mother, but questioning who she was, where – and why – she went and who they are leads them to find themselves instead.

The emotion in their journeys is huge and unsurprisingly something of a rollercoaster with moments of intense hope and joy, through fear, despair, anger and sorrow too. Katya’s ability to make you feel what the characters feel is truly something and it’s especially effective here as we see the fierce love of these two sisters as they struggle to protect each other and adjust to their changing roles in different ways.

I really loved the ending of this. There’s a sense of growth and hope and possibility (for both the twins and the wildlands) and nothing too tidy or implausible either. There’s a revelation near the end that brings the whole book together perfectly too.

Beautifully enhanced by Barry Falls’ stunning cover and intricate, detailed chapter headers that fit the story so well, this is another stunning book from Katya Balen. I was swept into the journey and had a wonderful few days of whispered stories, wildness and adventure (and the obligatory hot, buttered toast at the end!)