Just So Stories

UQP

April 2026

ISBN 9780702271045

RRP: $17.99

It’s quite amazing, even after fourteen years of doing this reviewing thing, how there will be batches of books all with really similar themes for similar ages. It’s like some pervasive mist in the air inspired so many authors to independently come up with quite similar storylines.

And I often repeat Tolkien’s theory from the Cauldron of Story (On Fairy Tales) and so each writer will come up with their own flavours of common tropes. But it still takes me by surprise with close similarities are repeated, until the next trend comes along. In the past month or so there have been numerous excellent middle school novels come along in which the protagonist is feeling the loss of a parent, either permanently (death) or long-term absence (abandonment or other).

Naturally that makes for a meaty narrative but it just seems curious that so many all at once, all with different twists but with a very ‘like’ premise, from all over Australia but also from the UK! Weird isn’t it? So after that preamble, here’s the latest [I’ve already reviewed a couple] and it’s a corker.

I really enjoyed this take because it reflects a common enough situation – abandonment by a parent – but with a twist, because it’s not the father who has abrogated responsibility for family but the mother. That may sound sexist and it’s not meant to be. It’s just that we often get narratives where a father is absent and a mum is left to cope with raising children and making a living etc – and not as often the reverse.

12-year-old Dell is a budding climate scientist. She understands the weather and its patterns inside out, she values facts and researches to learn more. So when crop circles suddenly appear in Tully, she knows they are bunkum, and there is an explanation that does not involve aliens.

But her mother, absent for years, is an extraterrestrial nutter and has come back to town full of her theories with an associate who appears to be well shifty, and tries to completely disrupt Dell’s family all over again.

After the mother’s long disappearance, Dell’s dad has cared for his four daughters with all due diligence, and there’s always his mother and step-father not far to also lend a hand. But even he is a bit dazzled by his flamboyant wife’s reappearance.

It seems to Dell that she’s the only one who sees through her mother’s same old tactics – charm everyone, get her own way, make herself important, and then choof off again without the slightest care for her own daughters or the hurt she’s caused their father.

Dell is determined to prove that the crop circles are a hoax but with the rising hysteria over the projected return of the ‘visitors’ it’s almost an impossible battle. But science and truth is on her side and finally Dell – along with everyone else -realises that the whole shebang is a farce. The mother waltzes off again, dodging the facts, and once again leaving a trail of emotional upset behind her.

There is a lot to consider in this one with themes on conspiracy theories, science vs tinfoil-hatters (ok, UFOlogists if you will), family, truth, self-belief and regard for others. I loved that it’s a Queensland setting of course and think this would make a fabulous serial read especially for Qlder kids to know a little more about a place that’s a long way off from our most populated areas.

Dell is a really likeable character. She may be stubborn in her beliefs, and probably too outspoken to be considered polite or tactful, but she’s honest – and if that’s brutally honest, well frankly her mother deserves it. If you’re looking for a top read for your astute MG kids from around Year 4 try this one out – it’s a 5 🛸🛸🛸🛸🛸rating from me.