The Tulip Touch (Puffin Modern Classics)
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Product Description
Review
The following reviews are based on the original book by Anne Fine.
•‘The Tulip Touch grapples with the topical question of what turns children into criminals. It engrossingly chronicles a childhood friendship with a disadvantaged girl who goes to the bad. This novel will make children aged between 11 and 14 think about the dangers of peer pressure and the collective responsibility of society for unhappy children. As always, Fine teaches her lessons by making her readers feel.’ Nicolette Jones, The Sunday Times.
•’It's a brilliant book.’ Ian Hislop
--This text refers to the Paperback edition.Book Description
Is anyone born evil? A powerful story about troubled teenagers.
--This text refers to the Paperback edition.
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Customer Reviews
Most Helpful Customer Reviews
37 of 40 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This is a very sad and difficult book to read because it deals with an unpleasant situation. It is about a little girl called Tulip who suffers mental and physical cruelty at home which no-one can stop happening. Her continued bad behaviour is a cry for help which is not answered and over several years she became mentally ill.
The story is written through the eyes of her best friend Natalie.It starts with Natalie's family moving in to a new area and running a hotel. Natalie is lonely and sees Tulip with a kitten in a field. Tulip is hesitant to speak but decides to be friends with Natalie. No-one questioned why, except police officer Stallworthy who later wondered what Tulip saw in Natalie. Everyone else shuns Tulip who rarely attended school an was always difficult and unpleasant. Natalie's mum states 'She's bright enough to see tha if people like her go around exactly what they want, everyone's miserable.'
The whole book becomes more uncomfortable and sinister. Natalie is banned from visiting Tulip's house. she visits once but is very frightened by what she sees and the odd behaviour of Tulip's parents especially her father who is a vindictive bully.
Natalie's father summed her up when he said "to really know right from wrong you need a certain emotional sympathy, and you learn that from being treated properly yourself." "If you've been brought up as if your feelings don't matter, you probably assume other people's don't matter much either."
Tulip spends as much time as possible with Natalie to escape her home, but the games they play are always weird such as Havoc, Road of Bones or Stinking Mackerel. Natalie's little brother Julius was often the but of these games and he got very scared and frightened by them. Gradually the games became wilder and more frightening. First Tulip favoured dustbin fires but slowly she switched to annoying neighbours, menacing bereaved parents, fellow pupils, terrorizing pets and leaving dead animals in cages.
No-one ever seemed to stop her or help her situation, so the darker side inside Tulip surfaced. As Natalie said "In her(Tulip's) eyes it was the world that was wrong. If the world had only been right, if things had only fallen out the way they should then she would never have to lie, or steal or be spiteful."
Natalie realises that Tulip is out of control and becomes so frightened she backs away and concentrates on her schoolwork. This disturbs Tulip who cannot handle the rejection and ends up burning down the hotel in an act of revenge. The book leaves a sense of sadness and guilt that no-one had really tried to reach out and help Tulip.Natalie sums it up "Each horrible thing that happens makes a difference and there have been too many of those in Tulip's life."
I did not enjoy this book because it made feel uncomfortable. It is well written because youm never know what is happening in Tulip's life which adds to the suspense. Don't read this book before bed time because you will never sleep!!!!!
14 of 15 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
Its brilliant and mesmerizing. When you start reading the book you'll just get sucked in and you wont be able to put it down. I'm glad that this book is on the reading list at our school because kids between 12-15 should read it. I don't think that you could find a child like tulip in the world because a lot of perants care too much about thier children these days. This book is about a girl, Natalie, who becomes friends with tulip because she feel sorry for her, as they become beter friends tulip starts playing more dangerous and dareing games....christmas.
5 of 5 people found the following review helpful
Format:Paperback
This book is quite simply the best book I have ever read aimed at a child audience on the difficult subject of abuse and parental derelication of responsibility. It is a chilling read - never graphic, but all the more sinister for the way it implies the despair - , and bravely and rightly asks children to put themselves in the main character's position constantly. What would I do about Tulip? Could I make a difference? Should I even try?
And at the centre of the book is Tulip herself, surely one of the most fascinating characters to appear in any children's novel. She has so many aspects - a richly imagined, complex, irrational, sometimes appealing and sometimes frightening character. Fine manages to make us believe in her and sympathise so much with her plight.
Fantastic.
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Most Recent Customer Reviews
A Story to Contemplate
I finally got around to reading The Tulip Touch this week and really enjoyed the characterisation and the setting of the story. Read more
Published 11 months ago by Lincs Reader
Great book for early teens
Bought the book as my Granddaughter was reading it at school and I was interested in what it was about. Read more
Published 14 months ago by viv
Harrowing yet poignant
I first read this book when i was in primary school and it has remained in my bookcase ever since. It is a fascinating albeit harrowing book to read, but i think it is an important... Read more
Published on 25 Jan 2010 by Eleanor Brae
Stinky Mackeral
Winner of the Carnegie Children's Book of the Year for 1996, this story concerns Natalie, daughter of a hotel proprietor and her friendship with Tulip of the title. Read more
Published on 11 Sep 2009 by Eileen Shaw
Equally enjoyable for adults as well as older children
My daughter was going to meet Anne Fine at a literary festival so read this in advance and quite enjoyed it. Read more
Published on 1 July 2009 by Literary Chick
fascinating - like a car crash
This story was ultimately enthralling with the disturbed character of Tulip making it up-put-downable. Read more
Published on 30 Oct 2008 by SC
The Tulip Touch
This was a dark but gripping story. When I read it I couldn't put it down because it was so fantastic. You can definately feel that you are in Natalie's mind. Read more
Published on 28 Jan 2007 by A. Gorman
cool
it was a good book but the only thing was the ending let it down a bit.Although it was a very interseting read at the beggining. tulip her games were stupid games. Read more
Published on 17 Jan 2007 by Kirsty
the tulip touch review
the tulip touch is a good book. but does not have a very good ending its about two girls.tulip and natily, natilie move near tulip because her dad owns the hotel. Read more
Published on 17 Jan 2007 by connor
Tulip Touch
The Tulip Touch is a very emotional book and asks a lot of questions which makes you think about evil things and good things. Read more
Published on 17 Jan 2007 by charlotte
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