The Maze [Paperback]

The Maze is an exciting and challenging novel from the pen of one of Canada's best science fiction and fantasy writers for young readers. Monica Hughes thrusts us into the troubled life of 15-year-old Andrea Austin, who has her fair share of problems. She's being raised by her dad, a cold professor of mathematics who doesn't seem to understand the pressures of being a contemporary teenager and who's more interested in making sure that dinner's precisely on time than in what's happening in Andrea's life. She's also the new kid at Abbotsville High and the latest victim of a cruel gang of school bullies known as the Six. Under the auspices of their leader, Crystal, the Six make Andrea's life hell, and she can't figure out how to get them to leave her alone.

After yet another bullying, she escapes into a cozy old antique shop where Sophia, the proprietress, gives her the Maze, a small black box inlaid with an intricate silver design. Andrea soon discovers that the Maze is an intriguing means of escaping from Crystal and company. But then everything seems to go wrong. When the Six attack Andrea in the park, Crystal and her second-in-command Serena suddenly disappear. Andrea discovers that they've been swept into the world of the Maze and only she can rescue them.

In The Maze, Hughes inventively explores bullying from the perspectives of both bullies and victims through an engaging fantasy fiction that's full of surprises. It's a welcome addition to the exciting fictional worlds that Hughes has opened up to teens in more than 30 novels, including Stormwarning, The Keeper of the Isis Light, and Invitation to the Game. (Ages 12 and older) --Jeffrey Canton

With their large trade paperback format and striking covers, the books in HarperCollins Canada's new imprint HarperTrophy Canada are immediately appealing. One of the books, multi-award winner Monica Hughes' The Maze is about a teenage outcast.
The protagonist, isolated from mainstream teenage life in Hughes' The Maze, is Andrea Austin whose odd clothing, dictated by her austere father, and her too obvious cleverness, make her a target for a group of girl bullies at her new high school. Already lonely and emotionally fragile in the aftermath of her parent's divorce, Andrea is adrift until she finds a mysterious box, with a maze-like design on its lid, in a strange curio store. The box proves to be the entry into another world controlled by the mind. When Andrea is swarmed by her tormentors, her fear and their anger trap the two, most dangerous ones, Crystal and Sabrina, in the world of the maze. At first, Andrea is relieved as the bullying stops, but soon she finds herself the focus of police questioning into the apparent disappearance of the two girls. She comes to realize that she must free them from the maze and the latter half of the book is given over to this, and to the changes which occur in Andrea as a result of her efforts and as she comes into her own.
The maze itself is controlled by the thoughts and feelings of those within in it, and this device works beautifully to allow Hughes to explore not only Andrea's feelings, but also to give insight into the mind of Crystal, showing what motivates her aggressive behaviour, without ever condoning it. The whole quest, with its surprises is engrossing, and cleverly reflects the events of the real world. Hughes' subtle writing falters only towards the dénouement, where she veers a little too much towards the facile. Andrea's problems are solved too neatly: She learns to stand up to her father, manages to establish contact with her mother, and gains almost instant acceptance at the school, a milieu which had initially been so indifferent to her plight. In particular, the rapprochement, but not friendship, reached between Andrea and her main tormentor, Crystal, may strike the reader as too easily arrived at.
Monica Hughes has a wonderful eye for the minutiae of high school life and the skill with which to reproduce this on the page. Hughes has the subtle cruelty of girls down pat. If all the books in the new HarperTrophy Canada imprint attain the high standard of these one, adolescent readers will be very well served.
Gillian Chan (Books in Canada) -- Books in Canada