Stunt Double - Tamsin Cooke

Finn is a free-running black belt, with a talent for acting-but when his big break arrives, it's not the role he was expecting at all. 

Recruited as a stunt double, he's pushed to his limits-scaling walls at high speed, jumping from dizzying heights, and diving into rocky waters-all without any safety gear. He's determined to push himself, but as the stunts get more dangerous, the lines between movie and reality are really starting to blur, and it becomes clear that he'll be luckily to escape this shoot with his life.

'Sometimes real life can be more exciting than the movies' and Finn is about to discover this himself. After finally getting a speaking role in the same teen action movie as his former friend and now arch-nemesis Blake, Finn is horrified when he loses the part to a girl. He doesn't have to brood for long though as Agatha Novak, the famed but rather eccentric director, catches him somewhere he shouldn't be. Fast forward a couple of days, Finn is now Blake's stunt double and they're heading out to Papua New Guinea to film some of the more daring stunts.

What Finn, Blake, Anna and Mawi don't realize is that Novak has an alternative agenda and doesn't care what lengths she has to go to achieve it or who she hurts. Only after Anna is injured and most of the crew disappear do the teenagers start to notice that things aren't quite as they seem. Suddenly finding themselves in 'life or death' situations it would appear that real life is maybe about to get both more exciting and dangerous.

Stunt Double is a fantastic read, you never quite know who is in on the real reason for the cast and crew to be in Papua New Guinea and who isn't. Novak doesn't hold back on some pretty cruel ways of persuading the children to do what she wants, in fact some of it is really quite scary for a boy thousands of miles away from everything and everybody he knows. The reason for their current location was amazing, without giving anything away it really was something spectacular and something so unbelievable that it made it seem all the more real. 

Tamsin Cooke has written a real page-turner of an adventure story, with a great cast of characters both young and old. Although Finn and Mawi were definitely my favourites I had a soft spot for our batty director who thoroughly deserved everything she got for dragging children into an incredibly perilous adventure, although I think Finn was quite rightly in his element! If you're looking for an addictive read, full of action with a healthy dose of friendship, then Stunt Double is perfect. I can't wait to find out if we're going to see more of Finn as although this story is finished, there's a "what? what just happened? now that's a bit of a cliff-hanger!" moment and I sincerely hope his adventures as a Stunt Double continue.

Stunt Double - Tamsin Cooke
ISBN - 9780192749826
Publisher - Oxford University Press
Release date - July 6th, 2017
Find - Goodreads | Book Depository