Friday Classic: Underrunners by Margaret Mahy

Tris lives with his father, Randall in a partly finished pole house ...life is good; they cope as best they can on their own. Years before, Tris's mother drove off in the family car to seek her fortune in Australia. Tris has very few memories of her. Tris has a solitary life - he is sometimes bullied by the Morley boys and Sylvia, one of his classmates, is always asking him when she can visit his house. The time Tris spends alone - he has created an imaginery world where he and an intergalactic secret agent called Selsey Firebone have many adventures.

Interwoven into this story is Tris's sudden meeting with Winola from the nearby Featherstonehaugh Children's Home and their continued adventures together. There are underrunners - a vast network of tunnels beneath the tussocky grass near his home. Winola hides out in one of the underrunners because Winola has a menacing character, who, she claims, is out to get her. Tris thinks it is one of Winola's stories but suddenly both are kidnapped at gunpoint and driven off to an unknown fate.

The underrunner tunnels are spooky and appear safe but are liable to collapse without warning, just like life can have unexpected ups and downs. This is a fast-paced narrative with good descriptions of the landscape, people and the imaged world that Tris has created. It would be enjoyed by year 6 plus.

Reviewed by Fiona Tags: New Zealand fiction year4-6 year 7-9