Books with author Melvin Burgess

I can give it up any time I want . . .Sometimes maybe you need an experience. The experience can be a person or it can be a drug. The experience opens a door that was there all the time but you never saw it. Or maybe it blasts you into outer space. This time it was Lily and Rob and Gemma spending all that time to make me feel one of them, but it was the drug too. All that crap―about Gemma leaving me, about Mum and Dad, about leaving home. All that negative stuff. All the pain . . . It just floated away from me, I just floated away from it . . . up and away . . . I leaned back and I looked at the book and I looked at them and Gemma smiled at me, a big soft smile, and her eyes were like marbles. "Better?" she said.Smack is the winner of the 1996 Carnegie Medal in Literature.

This award-winning classic teen novel gets a vibrant new look. The love story of two runaway teenagers, Gemma and Tar, and their struggles with heroin addiction. Melvin Burgess' most ambitious and complex novel is a multi-faceted and vivid depiction of a group of young people in the grip of addiction. It is told in many different voices, from the addicts themselves to the friends watching from the outside who try to prevent tragedy. Winner of the Carnegie Medal and the Guardian Children's Fiction Prize.

Winner of the Carnegie Medal and the Guardian Prize for fiction, two of England's most prestigious awards, Smack tells a penetrating story about heroin use, a topic that is becoming familiar in the news and one of importance to teens everywhere. The story begins with Tar, a fourteen-year-old, who runs away from home. He convinces his girlfriend, Gemma, to come with him, and it is not long before they are engulfed in a loose community of people living in abandoned buildings. Everything seems to be turning out so well: they have a roof over their heads, food to eat, and a brand-new group of friends. And when Tar and Gemma try their first hit of smack, they think life will keep on getting better.But before long, they find they've lost control. The search for the next hit becomes all-consuming--until a disaster forces Gemma to take matters into her own hands. Insightful, haunting, and real, Smack is the Go Ask Alice of the '90s. It's a book that every teenager should read--then pass along to a friend.

This 20th Anniversary edition of the classic novel comes with an introduction from former children’s laureate Malorie Blackman and bonus content following its controversial history, from its writing to when it won both the Carnegie Medal and the Guardian Children’s Fiction Prize. It was a love story. Me, Gemma and junk. I thought it was going to last forever. Tar loves Gemma, but Gemma doesn't want to be tied down. She wants to fly. But no one can fly forever. One day, finally, you have to come down. Melvin Burgess’ most ambitious and complex novel is a vivid depiction of a group of teenagers in the grip of addiction. Told from multiple viewpoints, Junk is a powerful, unflinching novel about heroin. Once you take a hit, you will never be the same again.

Winner of the 1996 Carnegie Medal in Literature and the Guardian Prize for fiction, two of England's most prestigious awards, Smack tells a penetrating story about heroin use, a topic that is becoming familiar in the news and one of importance to teens everywhere. The story begins with Tar, a fourteen-year-old, who runs away from home. He convinces his girlfriend, Gemma, to come with him, and it is not long before they are engulfed in a loose community of people living in abandoned buildings. Everything seems to be turning out so well: they have a roof over their heads, food to eat, and a brand-new group of friends. And when Tar and Gemma try their first hit of smack, they think life will keep on getting better.But before long, they find they've lost control. The search for the next hit becomes all-consuming--until a disaster forces Gemma to take matters into her own hands. Insightful, haunting, and real, Smack is the Go Ask Alice of the '90s. It's a book that every teenager should read--then pass along to a friend.

Life is good for Buck in Santa Clara Valley, where he spends his days eating and sleeping in the golden sunshine. But one day a treacherous act of betrayal leads to his kidnap, and he is forced into a life of toil and danger. Dragged away to be a sledge dog in the harsh and freezing cold Yukon, Buck must fight for his survivial. Can he rise above his enemies and become the master of his realm once again? With an inspirational introduction by award-winning author Melvyn Burgess, The Call of the Wild is one of the twenty wonderful classic stories being reissued in Puffin Classics in March 2015.

Dino, Jonathan, and Ben have got some problems, mostly with Jackie, Deborah, and Alison.Dino's finally convinced Jackie, the most beautiful girl in school, to go out with him. She drives him mad with lust, but she won't go all the way and relieve Dino of his desperately unwanted virginity.Jonathan likes Deborah. She's smart and funny and she makes him feel very sexy, but she's kind of plump and his mates won't let him hear the end of it. Also, a certain swelling has him convinced that he may have cancer of the penis. Ben's problem is in a different category altogether-- he's been seduced by Alison, the pretty young drama teacher at school. And what seems like a dream come true is actually making him miserable. Award-winning author Melvin Burgess has written a daringly honest and often hilarious account of contemporary teenage life, and the ups and downs that surround DOING IT.

Billy Elliot's tough, funny and heart-warming story is given new depth by best-selling author, Melvin Burgess. Billy's mother is dead, and his father and brother are fiercely involved in a bitter miners' fight that has split the local community. Billy's father wants his son to learn boxing, like he did and his father before him. But Billy is fascinated by the grace and magic of ballet and is determined to dance his way to a different future. Told from the differing viewpoints of Billy, his father and brother and his friend Michael, Melvin Burgess has captured the spirit of the original film screenplay while demonstrating the skill and inspiration he showed in his award-winning novel, "Junk".

PART I London is in ruins, a once highly advanced city now a gated wasteland. Within its walls, a bloody war rages between two clans. Hope is sparse, but the people believe the gods have risen from the dead. Odin himself has come to play a part in the lives of two twins, a brother and sister from the Volson clan. Siggy and Signy must come to grips with their destiny as London's future teeters on the edge of a knife....

When fourteen-year-old Nicholas Dane's mother dies, social services sends him to a home for boys where intimidation and violence keep order. After a number of fights and brutal punishments, Nick thinks that life can't possibly get any worse . . . until he realizes that the home's respected deputy head, who has been grooming him with sweets and solace, has something more frightening in mind. Acclaimed writer and truth-teller Melvin Burgess brings us, with Dickensian scope and compelling narrative drive, his most ambitious book yet.