The Twelve - Liz Hyder - ★★★★

AUTHOR: Liz Hyder

ILLUSTRATOR: Tom de Freston

GENRE: YA FAntasy (and a lot more)

PUBLICATION DATE: October 10, 2024

RATING: 4 stars.

In a Nutshell: So tough to describe this book in terms of genre or theme! It is whimsical in a sober way, contemplative without being morose, structured and yet so unstructured. Never expected to see a YA novel to have such depth! (All credit goes to the author, not the genre. Liz Hyder is marvellous!) I don’t know if YA readers will enjoy this, but adult moi loved it a lot.

Plot Preview:

1999. Kit, along with her mother and younger sister Libby, are enjoying the Christmas break in a caravan in Pembrokeshire, Wales. On the eve of the Winter Solstice, Libby insists on going to the church tower at midnight to test a prophecy she heard, and Kit has no choice but to accompany her. But there’s a strange accident that causes Libby and everything connected to her to vanish from the world. Even their mother doesn’t recollect who Libby is.

In this new world that has no trace of her younger sister, Kit is forced to wonder if she had actually made Libby up in a strangely real dream, until she bumps into a local boy named Story – who also remembers Libby. The two team up to discover why Libby vanished in such a mysterious way and how to get her back, but will they have enough time to learn the truth in a world with increasingly catastrophic natural and unnatural events?

The story comes to us in Kit’s first-person perspective.

This is my third book by Liz Hyder. I am a big fan of her writing and loved both ‘The Gifts’ and ‘The Illusions’. However, those were adult fantasies while this is a YA fantasy, and YA isn’t really my cup of tea. In the tussle between my love for the author and my dislike for the genre, the former won. As you can see, the result is quite positive. It proves that good authors can deliver regardless of genre constraints.

Bookish Yays:

⏳ Kit, a strong and courageous protagonist. She isn’t a typical YA character, being more on the introverted side. I guess she’s about 16, so her behaviour matches her age. Her first-person perspective is written brilliantly without going into extensive inner monologues.

⏳ Story, an equally strong character, deserves the shared lead role with Kit. The connection between the two of them progresses along with the plot and feels genuine.

⏳ There are minor shades of romance in the book, but this is never at the forefront of the plot. I appreciate how the author didn’t stress more on the romantic proceedings even though the target age group generally loves “shipping” characters together.

⏳ The storyline is not at all like that we see in typical YA Fantasy novels. (I wonder if this is because the author herself isn't a young adult. The same is applicable to ‘Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe’, which was written by Benjamin Alire Sáenz when he was in his fifties.) There’s a maturity to the writing and the characters, which is missing in most YA books. It also helps that the portrayal of adults is also realistic rather than idiotic. Perhaps that’s why it worked so well for me.

⏳ Though the official promo calls this a YA Fantasy, the plot straddles multiple genres. It’s like a strange YA apocalyptic fantastical environmental time-slip adventurous mystery-thriller mishmash. So weird and yet so wonderfully imaginative!

⏳ The plot covers true life issues as well as imaginary ones without any hitch. There’s a seamless transition between real and fantastical. Almost every scene evokes multiple emotions, but there is an introspective undertone throughout. It’s very thought-provoking, which also caught me by surprise.

⏳ Of all the themes covered in the book, the one closest to my heart was about respecting nature and realising the havoc we have wreaked on the planet and the climate thanks to our mindless destructive actions. I love how the book demonstrates the idea of “we are all in this together” in more ways than one. Some of the scenes gave me major Thanos (of the MCU) vibes!

⏳ The story also offers a deserved ode to the people of the past, whom we so vastly underestimate and easily dismiss as primitive, forgetting that without their initial developments, we wouldn't have lived today the way we do. The plot also highlights how we've lost so many basic survival skills in our overdependence on technology.

⏳ The descriptions are stunning! The writing is so picturesque that I could actually feel the Welsh setting in every scene. Such fabulous imagery!

⏳ A shoutout to the outstanding vocabulary as well! It is such a treat to see words used this intelligently.

⏳ The writing is slowburn yet the story moves at a fast pace. (Does that even make sense?) The slower tempo didn’t bother me at all because the storyline was so gripping right from the first scene that I just couldn’t keep the book aside!

⏳ I love the ending! To be frank, I don’t know if younger readers will share my opinion on this because it is not what we usually find in YA fiction (Not going into spoilers.) But I think it was the best ending for this kind of story.

⏳ Thanks to this book, I now know who Story Musgrave is. Loved that little nugget!

Bookish Nays:

⏲ There are some B&W illustrations in the book, which serve as section divisions. There were good, but as they didn’t depict any scene from the plot, being more object-oriented than action-oriented, I just hopped over them after a point.

⏲ The story leaves a few details unanswered. While these are mostly minor, I still wish we had more clarity on them.

⏲ There is a bullying arc in Kit’s past, but this felt a bit underdeveloped and unconvincing. I can see why it was kept to the periphery of the main plot – it was not related to the current events after all. However, I wish there had been a tad more focus on such an important plot point, especially as it shaped Kit’s current behaviour and is such a common issue faced by teens.

All in all, I find myself highly satisfied with this book. It helps that I enjoy literary fiction because you need a similar kind of mood to read this character-oriented, issue-based, slowburn novel. I continue to be a fan of this author and her beautiful writing and imaginative plotlines. Anything Liz Hyder writes is definitely entering my TBR. Even if it is meant for YAs. 😜

Much recommended! I don’t know how this book will work for a majority of young adults, especially those who devour mainstream YA novels and love to live in the moment. But to those young readers who aren’t afraid to try something offbeat and who are as focussed on the future as they are on the present, I strongly advocate this book.

My thanks to Pushkin Press for providing the DRC of “The Twelve” via NetGalley. This review is voluntary and contains my honest opinion about the book.