An Angel In Waiting (Vicky Angel - Jacqueline Wilson)

Member Name: karenuk

Product:	Vicky Angel - Jacqueline Wilson
Date:	12/06/03 (188 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: easy to read, important issues raised

Disadvantages: sad for some

My children have several Jacqueline Wilson books. My eldest three (aged 12 ½, 11 and 10) are all fans of hers. So today, when I had the urge to read a whole book in a couple of hours, I picked up one called Vicky Angel and read it.

The story begins happily enough, focusing on Jade Marshall and Vicky Waters, two Year nine girls who are best friends and have been since nursery school. Then, all of a sudden, there is an accident, a car crash, and Vicky dies. (This isn’t really giving anything away, as the title and cover make this fairly obvious!)

The rest of the book is about Jade coping with the grief of losing Vicky. However, this is written in an unusual way. Vicky reappears as a ghost and has conversations with Jade, who is the only person that can see her. While initially, this seems sweet and reassuring, it evolves into something more sinister as the story progresses.

The book isn’t scary though. After all, it’s Jade’s best friend – how could she ever be frightening? But over time, Jade kind of fades into the background and Vicky takes over. Jade loses weight, so that people notice and worry about her. She becomes withdrawn and when people try to get close, she pushes them away. But it’s not really her rejecting them. It’s Vicky. While Jade really wants to reach out and be hugged, Vicky ensures she only has her for company. In some ways, Jade seems to be taking on some of Vicky’s characteristics, even calling people names in the way Vicky used to do.

But is Vicky really possessing her friend’s mind, controlling her moods and even the words that come out of her mouth? Or is the ghost of Vicky just an embodiment of the grief and guilt that are eating away at Jade? The book examines this and although it sways you one way then another, you are ultimately left to decide this for yourself.

In some ways, the story is a simple one. Jacqueline Wilson tells it in a way which
teenagers and slightly younger children can understand. There are no complicated theories, but no hard line ‘this is the truth’ facts either. Jade’s emotions are easy to relate to. We have all felt guilty, all felt trapped, all felt lost and all felt sad. Although Vicky dies, we aren’t told she goes to Heaven. The concepts of Heaven, Hell, angels and devils are discussed by the two girls – but everything is left open to interpretation, nothing is preached or declared as being ‘right’.

I was also impressed with the author’s description of Vicky. While children who die tragically young are always mentioned in tributes in glowing terms, Vicky is not deified in the same way. Although her death sees a pavement full of flowers, letters and cuddly toys a la Princess Diana, she is soon pictured as being a girl who was definitely not perfect. As the story progresses, Vicky’s bad points overtake her good ones, as she becomes even more manipulative.

Jacqueline Wilson has a lovely flowing style, which is easy to get into. The story grabs you and you soon become involved with the characters and interested in their lives. But I could list many children’s’ authors who do this. The thing I found unique about Wilson’s style in this book is that she describes what Jade is going through in a way that enables the reader to both empathise and criticise. In one way, we are in Jade’s head, feeling her emotions bubbling to the surface, feeling the turns burning behind her eyes. But we can also step back and shake our head sadly, seeing what she should do, what she must do, if she is to survive herself.

For whether or not Vicky is ‘real’, Jade’s feelings are. I recognised many of her symptoms from my own experience of depression – the lethargy, the apparent pointlessness of it all, the exhaustion, the nightmares, the lack of enthusiasm, the need to withdraw ̵
1; into your covers, into your head, into your own tiny world where you can’t be hurt any more. Depression makes you selfish – not out of choice, but as a kind of survival mechanism. In Jade’s world, she pushes away people who make friendly gestures towards her, often hurting them with spiteful words she doesn’t mean.

Not only do we see Jade’s world from inside her head, but we also observe her through the eyes of her parents, her classmates and her teachers. As various people try to get through to her, to penetrate the boundaries she puts up, she retreats further – into a world where only her and Vicky seem to exist, together.

But finally, others manage to puncture the boundaries slightly, letting chunks of light in - a boy in class, Jade’s French teacher, her Games coach, a chaplain… Will this mean a return to normality for the grieving teenager? Or will she follow Vicky, who keeps urging her to sacrifice her own life and join her?

The book obviously deals with some deep issues and taboo subjects, but it never seems ‘heavy’. There are many funny moments throughout and each chapter has a cute little line drawing based around the number. The book is 154 pages long, split into fifteen chapters.

I would say this book is suitable for children aged between nine and fourteen years old. My ten-year-old daughter enjoyed it, but commented that it was ‘sad’. She also expressed strong views as to what Jade should have done, proving she could see through Vicky’s ‘friendship’. The deeper issues seem to have passed her by, but that’s not a bad thing.

My eldest daughter said the book was very well written and moving, commenting that it brought a tear to her eye the first time she read it. While this thirty-something mother remained stoically dry-eyed, I would recommend this to any child in that age group.

Jacqueline Wilson has
also written books for a younger audience (such as Cliffhanger) and a slightly older audience (the Girls In Love series), so there will be something out there that most children will enjoy. Her easy to read style is a joy, the illustrations are enchanting and she is unafraid of bringing ‘adult’ subjects into a child’s world. Recommended.


VICKY ANGEL by Jacqueline Wilson
Hardback £10.99

Summary: