Tuckshop Terrors by Leo Baker

Title: Tuckshop Terrors

Author: Leo Baker

Genre: Horror/Adventure/Thriller

Publisher: Loaf Books

Published: 1^st May 2024

Format: Paperback

Pages: 260

Price: $24.95

Synopsis: Kip is a 12-year-old country boy trying to fit in to a new town, new school, and find new friends. It’s not easy when he’s struggling with his diabetes, and all the other kids eat from the canteen. He’s the odd one out, avoiding confrontations with the beefy kid Jesse Reece, and drawing unwanted attention from the lurking headmaster, Rinkley.

At his new school, Kip can’t get to the irresistible food at the canteen without defying his parents, ditching his friend Lucille, making enemies and drawing attention from the weird headmaster. While that delicious junk food seems always out of reach, Kip discovers there’s something more sinister than the saturated fats. There’s a scheme emerging that’s going to affect everyone, forever. Through a series of mysterious events, Kip and his new friends figure out that there’s a connection between the food corporation next door to the school, and the spate of crime washing through their town.

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When Kip and Lucille are the only ones left, his suspicions are turned upside-down, as he discovers being the odd-one-out can be the key to survival.

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• Children outsmarting adults!
• Food as a social currency.
• Being different can be a unique advantage.
• Belonging.
• People are not who they seem – for both good and bad.

• True friendship / being true to yourself.
• You are what you eat!

• Bullying and self-esteem.
• Empowering children with disabilities – deafness, diabetes.

• The place of food in culture.
• Multicultural values.
• Family dynamics.
• Corporate corruption / greed / control vs community.

~*~

Kip is about to start a new school for high school, in a new town, where he has to find new friends. His parents think it’ll be easy, but they’re also very worried about him because he’s just been diagnosed with diabetes and needs to have insulin and watch his blood sugar. Kip gets off to a bad start with classmate, Jesse, who has hearing difficulties. And when he continually turns Reggie down to head over to the canteen for lunch, he makes friends with Lucille – they both bring their lunch from home. Soon, Kip and Lucille realise that something strange is going on at the school and with their headmaster, Rinkley – something about the food and the behaviour of the town and a series of thefts taking place. It seems that only Lucille and Kip are immune – so it is up to them to find out what is going on, and what the food corporation next to the school has to do with it – but can they?

Kip’s adventure mystery is shrouded in deception and uncertainty as he grapples with bullies at school, including Jesse Reece – a huge kid that everyone seems to have some level of antagonism with. At least, that’s what it feels like to Kip as he hears stories about how Jesse lost his hearing from all the boys in his class. In doing so, Leo explores bullying and power dynamics in a new school, and how we respond to people around us when we don’t have all the facts, highlighting how people adapt to a new environment by doing whatever they feel they have to do. Poor Kip – he wanted to fit in and do the right thing, but in the early chapters, whatever he tried didn’t work, and I could see that peer pressure was going to be a hefty part of the book in a myriad of ways.

His friendship and connection with Lucille powers much of the novel as they realise they can hear things that the other students can’t, and slowly, they realise that the food from the canteen is the link between the strange goings on and behaviour – and they hatch a plan to solve the mystery of the spate of crime and get to the bottom of what is happening with food. The food from the canteen and the factory next to the school is used as a currency as well as a way to control the town and for someone to take it over. The first half is set over about a week or so, as it leads up to the climax during the second half of the book – and this is where I felt the characters came through for each other, where they started to help each other. And it was Kip’s innovative problem-solving throughout and his way of seeing what nobody else could. This celebration of his ingenuity shines through as Kip works out why he and Lucille are unaffected and how to help people, as well as starting to understand that others acted like they thought they should, rather than as they wanted to.

I like that this empowered the kids in the book, and showed how creative problem solving can fix things, and what happens when we make an effort to understand those around us, especially after things have started off as a misunderstanding.  Leo executed this well, and showed how important it is to talk to people and get to know them before making judgements.

Overall, this novel represented disability and multiculturalism effectively, perhaps showing that what makes someone different and makes them stand out can be what saves the day – and the town. It is a book that I think middle grade and early young adult readers will enjoy, and for those seeking books that will appeal to boys, this might suit them as it examines how boys behave when they are together and their interests in a wild mystery adventure. I think it is also a sneaky way to encourage kids to eat healthily, or to at least eat canteen food in moderation. This book is effective in many ways and I think there will be readers out there for it.