Polar Boy
Age 9+
General Fiction
An absorbing historical adventure by the award-winning author of the Samurai Kids series, Sandy Fussell.
“The ancient ones whisper to me, Iluak,” Nana says. “They talk about you. They say a bear is waiting.” In the land of snow and ice, where the midwinter sun doesn’t rise and it’s black all day, Iluak is afraid. But he’s not afraid of the darkness. No one here is. He’s afraid of whiter things.
Creators
Sandy Fussell lives on the NSW South Coast with her husband and two sons. She studied mathematics at university, is intensely interested in history, and now works in IT. She is afraid of bears, volcanoes and samurai swords and has written a book about each one of them. Her series Samurai Kids has been hugely successful: Book 1, White Crane, won an IBBY 2011 Outstanding Book for Children with Disabilities and has been listed for awards in the US, UK, Japan and China. Book 3, Shaolin Tiger, and Book 5, Fire Lizard, were Notable Books in the Younger Readers Category in the Children’s Book Council of Australia (CBCA) Awards. Shaolin Tiger was also short-listed in the Speech Pathology Awards – Upper Primary Category, 2010. Polar Boy, Sandy’s first stand-alone novel, was short-listed in 2009 for the CBCA Book of the Year Award for Younger Readers, and her second stand-alone novel, Jaguar Warrior, was a CBCA Notable in 2011. For further information please visit her website: www.sandyfussell.com
Reviews
Flawless and makes utterly compelling reading … Sandy Fussell has expertly captured another time and place, exploring a bleak, deadly wasteland of crushing coldness and desolation, made all the more real by the fragile but tenuous grip on life of these hardy Inuit people. Polar Boy is a gripping, well-researched and thoroughly enjoyable adventure.
Magpies
Fussell draws us into Iluak’s world with exquisite description, empathetic characters and a story with universal appeal.
Good Reading Magazine
