Review - The Last Life of Lori Mills

 

 

The Last Life of Lori Mills by Max Boucherat, cover art by Thomas Humeau, published by Harper Collins Childrens

 

Let me introduce you to one of the most original, creepy and exciting children's books I've read in a while - The Last Life of Lori Mills sees real life and gaming merge until it's impossible to say where one ends and the other begins in this deeply unsettling and claustrophobic new book.

 

Lori is a big computer game fan, and along with best friend Shoelace, has created a complex world of fun places to explore and animal companions to find in Voxminer - a brilliant reimagined world-building game which seems to blend the most appealing parts of Minecraft and Pokemon to create a recognisable and appealing game that young readers will be both invested in and immersed in.

 

And when I say immersed...

 

...when I started reading this, I thought it was going to go down the classic 'sucked into a video game' type route, but this is SO much more insidious and disorienting than that. I don;t want to say too much, because part of the appeal is seeing it all unfold through Lori's eyes and trying to describe that is a) impossible and b) likely to lessen the effect of it somewhat.

Suffice to say, Lori finds her reality and her game merging until she no longer knows what's real, what's in her house, what's in her game and what's in her mind. And as if that wasn't enough, there's a sinister, fabled Voxminer character who seems to be out to get her...but they're just an urban legend, a part of the game's fanfic...aren't they?!

Lori makes for such a fantastic narrator - their voice is perfectly pitched at that 'almost a teenager-think I'm grown up but still want cute stuff and need my grown ups more than I think I do stage'. She is funny, sassy, desperate for the freedom to Be Left in the House on Her Own - that mythical rite of tween-teen passage - but also still needs her mum, and is still awkward and unsure of herself at times, still figuring out who she is; there's some heartfelt coming-of-age type realisations and growing up moments towards the end of the book especially.

She has a relatable, dry style that young readers will immediately 'get', and the book itself feels utterly refreshing in this way too. It's exciting too to see gaming represented as such a key part of both Lori's character and the plot. Kids are often huge gamers (ask any parent who has grappled with screen time), but games in books are often a token mention. Here, however, the game is given centre stage and provides us with a totally new perspective and a brilliant new type of world to get lost in.

And the world-building is superb, but not in our usual richly-described foreign country or fantasy world sort of way, in the way that children really will get behind - in that it is a world that has literally been built. In a game. Like the ones they themselves play and build worlds in. It's so clever and the way it seamlessly blends Lori's reality with the game's is scarily good too.

This has elements of other things (there's definite Jennifer Killick vibes, which is excellent because we need more funny kids' horror), but really does feel like something totally new; it feels like something those kids who 'don't read' (or more accurately 'don't read novels like their parents want them to, preferring minecraft tutorials or pokemon encyclopedias' - FYI Parents - THIS IS STILL READING), it feels like a novel those kids might also love.

Hugely original, this is a book for gaming kids everywhere - and those who love a good scare! Full of heart yet utterly terrifying - this deserves to be huge and I can't wait for book two.