Into the Volcano

Seb and his best friend Clay are on a school trip in Colorado, USA, when the unimaginable happens: while the coach is stopped at a petrol station, an armed robbery goes wrong. Several people are shot, and Clay is seriously injured.

In London, Vivi is attending a major theatre audition when she gets a really strong feeling her grandmother is there watching her. Later that day she learns her grandmother has died in the Colorado shooting.

Thrown together by this tragic event, Seb and Vivi become unexpected friends. But Seb has a personal mission. Just before Clay was hurt, he was telling Seb about a special rainbow pool at the heart of the sleepy super-volcano, Yellowstone Park. Now, Seb believes that making a wish there will save Clay’s life, and persuades Vivi to help him make it a reality. However, getting there means navigating not just their grief, but everything that the Yellowstone has to throw at them, from bears and wolves to lightning storms and superhot mud pools…

Into the Volcano is another wonderful nature-based adventure from Jess Butterworth, though the big themes of grief and trauma make the emotional journey equally as important to the story as the physical one.