Baron Adam - You Wont Believe This

Contents

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BOY UNDERWATER

YOU WONT BELIEVE THIS

Name: Cymbeline Igloo

Teacher: Miss Phillips

Name of Book: WAR AND PEACE

Author: Leo Tolstoy

Rating: NO stars

Review: This book is one hundred per cent RUBBISH. You so should not waste your time on this book. There is probably a film of it. Most of it is Peace, and the War doesnt come for ages. I mean AGES. Im surprised the soldiers could still remember how to fire their rifles. Or that they didnt just die of boredom. There are about three hundred pages of Peace. Calling it WAR AND PEACE is a con because you expect the War FIRST. It should be called Peace and War. Or Peace, Peace, Peace, More Peace and War (Though Not Much). You could skip straight to the War but I wouldnt even bother doing that because it isnt even that good. There are no pictures. And after the French FINALLY do attack the Russians, guess what?

Its a draw.

A DRAW!!

All that and its 00! And you dont know who anyone is because theyve all got six names each. Jacky Chapman would be Jacky Chapmanov (I think) or Ivan Chapmanov or Vanya Chapmanov or Ivan Ivanovich, or Jacky Jackovich Chapmanovich, by which time youd have completely forgotten who he was. Or which side he was on. And then, in the end, when the French actually DO win guess what?

They just go home!

So why did they bother coming in the first place?

Honestly! WAR AND PEACE is totally terrible, the only good thing being the bits where you learn what war does to the normal people whose houses are all destroyed and have to flee. It made me think of Nanai and Thu.

So maybe its not THAT bad.

Should we order copies of this book for the school library?

NO.

Would you recommend this book to a friend?

YES (as a joke).

Which character did you most identify with?

The Tsar. He wasnt in it much but he kept telling the others to get on with the fighting.

Would you read another book by the same author?

HE WROTE OTHER BOOKS?! NOOOOOOO!!!!!! Why did they let him?!

Which part of the book did you most enjoy?

The end.

Cymbeline Igloo (yes, really!) has NEVER been swimming.

Not ever. Not once.

By how hard can it be? Hes Googled front crawl and hes found his dads old pair of trunks. Hes totally ready.

What hes not ready for is the accident at the pool or how it leads his mum to a sudden breakdown.

Now, with the help of friends old and new, Cymbeline must solve the mystery of why his mum never took him near water and it will turn his whole life upside down

So many people helped me write this book, some in ways theyll never know. Nghiem Ta gave me great advice about the experience of refugees from Vietnam. Naomi Delap offered support and ideas, while Dan and Helen Delap let me live in their house while I was writing it. Franklin Baron, Viola Baron and Frieda Baron pushed me through to the end. Benji Daviess wonderful illustrations once more help to bring Cymbeline and his friends to life. Nick Lakes insights during the editing process were fabulous, as was the support of the rest of the HarperCollins team, including Jo-Anna Parkinson, Jessica Dean, Samantha Stewart, Jessica Williams and Sarah Hall. Cathryn Summerhayes at Curtis Brown continues to be agent supreme. Mostly, however, Id like to thank the thousands of teachers, librarians and young people who have embraced Cymbeline by reading about him, writing to me, welcoming me to their schools or dressing up as him on World Book Day.

Heres something you wont believe.

Veronique Chang did NOT get a Distinction in her Grade 5 piano. In fact, she only just passed! Why should you be surprised? Well. This is Veronique were talking about our class genius. Answers LOVE her! They seem to float down to her from the ceiling before they get to anyone else (Marcus Breen calls her Siri). It was her birthday last month and I asked her what she wanted.

War and Peace, she said, and I frowned at her.

Greedy.

What do you mean?

Well, you cant have both, I said. And anyway, Im not the prime minister, how am I supposed to organise either?

Veronique looked at me. Its a book. By Tolstoy?

Oh, I said. Bet its not as good as Mr Gum, though.

And when I found a copy later in the Blackheath Bookshop I realised that it certainly wasnt.

As for music, Veronique is INCREDIBLE. When she did her Grade 4, Mrs Johnson (our last head teacher) made her stand up in assembly. Veronique, she announced, had got the highest mark in the whole COUNTRY. Veronique wasnt even surprised.

I was lucky, she said, looking down at me with a shrug. My glissando was off.

I was about to ask what she meant but Mrs Johnson made her go up to play one of her pieces. Wolfman Amadeus Gocart (I think). And wow! The only time Ive seen fingers move as fast was when Lance brought in a bag of Haribos on his birthday.

Marcus Breen started clapping at one point, but that was actually a quiet bit and Veronique went on some more. When she did finish, I stared at her.

Amazing, I said. If also quite boring.

Lance agreed. Youre brilliant, he said. Does that mean you can play um ?

What?

He was so in awe he could hardly say it. Star Wars?

I dont know, Veronique answered. Whos it by?

Lance had to think about it. Obi-Wan Kenobi.

Is he Renaissance or baroque?

Jedi, Lance said.

That was six months ago. She got the Grade 5 back last week. I was at her house. Veroniques mum came into the kitchen waving an envelope. She had a smile on her face but it faded. Her mum had the envelope in one hand and the results in the other and she just stared at them, amazement about to turn to disbelief, when she sighed and picked up her phone.

I think there might have been a mistake, she said. Its Veronique Chang. C. H. A. N. G.

But there wasnt. The woman on the phone was sure of it. Veronique hadnt got a Distinction and she hadnt even got a Merit.

Well done anyway, her mum said (because shes really nice). But then she got on the phone again, this time to Veroniques piano teacher, and walked off into the living room to talk to him. I dont think Veronique wanted to be there when she came back so we went outside, then down to the little wooden house at the bottom of their garden where her granny used to live (who she calls Nanai). It was quiet in there. And dusty. We stood for a minute, not speaking, just looking at all the old photographs that lined the walls, and then down at Nanais chair. It was even emptier than the rest of the place. There was a hollowed-out bit, likethe empty spaces wed seen at the Pompeii exhibition at the British Museum. On top of it was a photograph. Old. Black and white, no glass left in the frame. I picked it up and we both stared at it until Veronique did something that scared me.