10-14-year-olds: Prince of darkness Ian McEwan serves up a delight while Jacqueline Wilson makes painful family situations seem bearable, writes Orna Mulcahy.
Magic tricks and spells, nightmares, wanton murders, restless spirits, a corpse in an ocean of gas, dense dangerous forests of eternal night where things howl in the dark, a girl who howls and spits pins, another impregnated with the devil's spawn, fingertips that vanish - it's all happening in this crop of books aimed at young readers - some would say too young.
I was about to pass on a handful of them to a 12 year-old who devours books, when her mother stopped me. "No thanks," she said, "They look so horrible I wouldn't let her read them."
In fact not all the books are horrible, but some of the jackets are pretty grim. Catherine Fisher's Darkhenge (The Bodley Head, £10.99) has stunted trees like torn- apart limbs raised to the ghostly light of the moon, while Oisín McGann's The Harvest Tide Project (O'Brien Press, €7.95) has spooky cats' eyes staring out of swirling poison green waters. Not the sort of books that parents would be drawn to, perhaps, but there's obviously a big appetite for horror among the over-10s and pre-teens.
The threat of modern-day germ warfare hangs over The Harvest Tide Project, the first in a series called The Archesian Tales by the Dublin writer Oisín McGann. It tells the story of Taya and Lorkrin, who stumble on a secret room in their uncle's house where they accidentally tear a sheet of vellum that drips blood and unleashes a hex that will ultimately wipe out the world with deadly gas unless they and Shessil Groach, the botanist, can stop it. Along the way they have to deal with the Noranians, but being shape- changers gives them a distinct advantage.
Catherine Fisher dug up Roman pottery on archeological digs before she turned to novel writing and her latest book, Darkhenge, concerns an ominous black ring of timbers that sprout from the earth which may hold the key to why Rob's sister cannot wake from her coma after a riding accident. If he can unlock the secrets of the Unworld then he can reclaim his sister, but to do that he has to battle with forces of a dark and menacing forest.
Julie Hearn serves up a dark tale of fear, suspicion and potions set at the height of the witch frenzy in England in the 1640s, in The Merrybegot (Oxford, £5.99). Nell, the cunning woman's granddaughter, is said to have put a spell on the minister's two daughters, and the Witchfinder General is on his way to investigate. Meanwhile the elder sister falls pregnant. Nearly 50 years on, the younger of the daughters looks back on what happened next, from the home she moved to with her father and sister, in Salem, Massachusetts. The terror of the time is woven through the book, along with a few useful spells and some fairly graphic description of childbirth, but despite the annoying West Country dialect, it's well worth reading right through to the author's notes which expand on why so many ministers' daughters were prone to being hexed.
Septimus Heap Magyk by Angie Sage (Bloomsbury, £12.99) is a sumptuous hardback, with a satisfyingly square shape and a gorgeous purple and gold dust jacket designed to look like an old ledger of secrets. It's a first novel for Sage, and while it looks a little like a prop from a Harry Potter movie, it's an instantly gripping yarn involving babies lost and found, fierce competition between wizards, and the evil doings of DomDancer who can't get on with ruling the world because there's a good princess in his way. It's not surprising it has already been sold in 15 countries as it's a book to gallop through - all 564 pages of it. Ideal for the Easter holidays.
Another big read is John Dickenson's The Widow and the King (David Fickling, £12.99), which runs to over 600 pages. It's a sequel to his first novel, The Cup of the World, but even if you haven't read it, you'll be quickly drawn into the dark and menacing world of mountain kingdoms and blasted fortresses where unleashed spirits play havoc with the lives of Ambrose and Sophia, the son of a king and the daughter of a powerful woman. Conniving courtiers, treachery galore and violent battles give tremendous pace to this book, which though beautifully written, is rather dour and will make most readers feel glad that that they live in the here and now.
Daydreamer, by Ian McEwan (Red Fox, £4.99), is something completely different. It's McEwan's first book for children, and as with his other work, one picks it up in some trepidation waiting for something horrible to happen. Instead it's a real delight. Ever wanted to know what it's like to be a cat, or a baby, or a 10 year-old for that matter? Peter finds out. Peter is boy who likes to think about things a lot and who gets into all sorts of situations, like being attacked by his sister's 60 dolls who want to tear him limb from limb because he's taking up valuable bedroom space. There's a brilliant chapter about grown-ups and how all they like doing is sitting around talking or running pointless errands when they could be running on the beach, having adventures, like children. It's scarily accurate, but not in the least threatening, just a little sad.
Finally, the latest book from Jacqueline Wilson, Clean Break (Doubleday £10.99), won't hold too many surprises for her fans. Yes, there's a marriage break-up, even worse it happens just after Christmas and yes, Em and her little sister and brother Vita and Maxie are miserable and want their Dad to come home, but life must go on. Lots of things happen when they move in with Gran, like Em meeting her real Dad, a horrible big beefy man who disappeared long ago, their Granny meeting a new boyfriend in Spain, and Em meeting her absolute idol, the author Jenna Williams who tells her that she's a good story teller herself. Still, none of it will bring their Dad back until Christmas comes around again and there's a big surprise for all of them. Wilson manages to make the most painful family situations seem bearable, with plenty of laughter and tears along the way.
Orna Mulcahy is an Irish Times journalist