The Boy Who Made it Rain

Interesting, intriguing and irritating all describe this book.

The format is interesting as Conaghan uses multiple narrators; each one gives a different perspective on Clem Curran, an English boy and his first term in a comprehensive school in a working class district of Glasgow. Clem does not fit in with the other students; his accent, his clothes, his choice of music and above all his interest in schoolwork make him different. He becomes the target of a gang of bullies.

A tragic incident is hinted at as the seven narrators give their opinions or statements and a picture begins to form. This is intriguing and the reader, who does not discover exactly what has happened until the very end. The narrators comprise students and adults and Conaghan shows considerable skill in giving each his or her own voice, although the amount of current teenage slang is rather irritating at the beginning. Also the voice of one of the teenagers is written as a dialect yet the others have the same background except Clem of course.

The narrators’ statements sometimes corroborate others, sometimes contradict and succeed in hooking the reader.  This is an unusual novel from a brave independent publisher who should be commended as it is a real page-turner for its target audience of young adults and indeed for much older ones as well.