I just finished Red Rage, a young adult novel by Brigitte Blobel, translated into English by Rachel Ward. It’s the story of an angry teenage girl who turns to violence on the wasteland-like outskirts of an unnamed city.

It was great. And excruciating. One of those books that kept getting worse and worse for the poor main character until I wanted to yell into the pages. “Get her out of the closet! You’ve forgotten the kid in the closet!!”

Authors who allow their characters to spiral into such messes always impress me. I would live in fear that my book would have to end with the apocalypse. Which this one almost does…