'I am a century old, an impossible age, and my brain has no anchor in the present. Instead it drifts, nearly always to the same shore: the year I discovered love'. In the early sixties on an East Anglian beach, a fragile wooden hut is harried daily by the sea. It is ignored by the boys from the nearby boarding school who stumble past on their birch-enforced runs. Until the day, one sixteen-year-old boy stops and comes face to face with the hut's owner: enigmatic, beguiling, and beautiful Finn. The hut and the beach - but most of all Finn - provide a haven away from the petty rules and bullies. But they also hold a mysterious, fragile secret. A secret that will be tested by friendship, growing adolescent love and the terrifying fury of the sea.

 

This book is the winner of numerous awards. It was recognised by the The Whitbread Award, now called 'The Costa Book Awards'. These are a set of annual literary awards recognising English-language books by writers based in Britain and Ireland. They were inaugurated for 1971 publications and known as the Whitbread Book Awards until 2006 when Costa Coffee, then a subsidiary of Whitbread, took over sponsorship. It was recognised by the Carnegie Award. The CILIP Carnegie Medal is awarded by childrens librarians for an outstanding book written in English for children and young people. It also was recognised by the New Angle Award for Literature.

There are 208 pages in this book. This book was published 2008 by Penguin Books Ltd .

Meg Rosoff is the celebrated author of How I Live Now , winner of the Guardian Fiction Award. Her second book Just in Case won the Carnegie Medal.