The Accidental Stowaway

Written by Judith Eagle Kim Geyer (illus.)
Review by Elizabeth Hawksley

Liverpool, 1910. The awkward 12-year-old Patch has spent her childhood being handed from one reluctant relation to another—she knows she doesn’t fit in, but she is determined to look after herself and live the life she wants. Then one day everything goes spectacularly wrong and, accused of a crime she didn’t commit, she escapes her pursuers by roller-skating up a gangplank onto an ocean liner bound for New York—only to become an accidental stowaway when it sets sail.

There are criminals aboard, and one of them has spotted her; there are other stowaways, too, each with their own secrets. But there are friends to be made as well as enemies to outwit and, as Patch scurries from steerage down in the hot and dirty bowels of the ship and up to the posh suites where the ultra-rich stay, she must learn that dangerous skill: hiding in plain sight.

I loved this book; it’s about friendship and loyalty; not making instant judgements, and learning who to trust. Patch will need all her wits about her if she is to keep herself and her friends safe. I read the book at a gallop, then re-read it slowly, with relish. It reminded me of the Edwardian children’s classic, Frances Hodgson Burnett’s The Secret Garden, where young Mary, like Patch, struggles to make a life for herself and decide what sort of person she wants to be.

I then recalled another novelist’s advice: ‘Kill off the heroine’s mother!’ Drastic? Possibly, but Catherine Morland in Jane Austen’s Northanger Abbey would never have made such catastrophic mistakes if her sensible mother had been there—and Catherine’s misadventures certainly grab the reader’s attention. Judith Eagle has taken this option and twisted it, and the result is a terrific read for children from 10 up.