I picked this up at a friend's house out of mild curiosity, and was completely hooked by the end of the first chapter. It's intended for older children or young teenagers, and features a 14-year-old girl called Vivien who is hit by a terrible tragedy on the first page. Her ordered, contented life falls apart and she finds herself having to adapt to noisy siblings, a huge comprehensive school, and the potential for remedial classes without her beloved music.

The plot is perhaps over-simplistic; Vivien finds that things start to get better when she thinks about God and starts praying, but it's nicely done without being twee or preachy. And there's certainly no miracle in her circumstances; instead, she starts to change and to see things from other people's perspectives.

Vivien's siblings are somewhat caricatured, some of her new teachers are depressingly awful, and their piano teacher amusingly dreadful... but even in such a short book (less than 100 pages) I built up quite a good picture of this frightened, stubborn and angry teenager who has to learn in a short space of time to overcome terrible grief and adjust to new and difficult circumstances.

Discussion of O levels and CSEs dates this back to the 1980s, when this was first published; but the issues are quite relevant to children of any generation, the writing is good, the story fast-paced. Once I'd started, I could barely put it down. ( )