Moonrise

Teenager Joe hasn’t seen his big brother for ten years, since Ed’s on death row in a Texan prison for a murder for which he’s always claimed innocence. Now the date for Ed’s execution is set, Joe is determined to spend his last few weeks close by, ever hopeful that they will overturn the execution.

Moonrise is the first-person story of Joe in those last weeks, when the brothers are able to get to know each other properly for the first time in a series of prison visits.

The novel is written in Sarah Crossan’s pioneering (and now trademark) free verse style, and fans of One – her Carnegie-winning exploration of life as a conjoined twin – will lap it up.

It’s a stirring, poignant and thought-provoking book about poverty, injustice, brotherly and romantic love (Joe’s relationship with Nell, a girl he meets in Texas is very beautifully and sensitively told). Tissues are required.