Torn Away [Paperback]

After his mother and younger sister are killed in a terrorist bombing in their native Belfast, Declan joins the Holy Terrors, a youth gang modeled after the IRA. When the authorities catch up with him, Declan is sent--very much against his will--to a small town in British Columbia, to live with his father's brother Matthew and his family. Angry, embittered and determined to return to Ireland as soon as possible, Declan has little affection for his gentle uncle, whom he considers a "meddling, do-good fixer" and a cowardly runaway. He himself undertakes several daring escapes. Gradually, however, the tranquility of his new home leads Declan to reexamine his notions of courage and heroism. Flashbacks give a bitter taste of the violence that forms a part of everyday life in Belfast and of Declan's impassioned fury. As the narrative moves to its easily anticipated happy ending, however, the plot starts seeming forced. Burdened by the novel's overaccentuated messages of pacifism, characterization suffers: Matthew and his wife, for instance, are so sweet-natured that they don't seem entirely real. Ages 12-up.
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Grade 6-9-After his mother and sister were killed in a bombing incident, 13-year-old Declan Doyle took to the streets of Belfast with a gang called the Holy Terrors. His pre-IRA training is now cut short when he is "torn away from his native soil" and sent to live with his deceased father's brother in western Canada. Driven by dreams of revenge, the boy runs away, planning to return home to Ireland. Unable to escape, he makes a deal to stay with his relatives in their idyllic Vancouver fishing village for three months. Adjusting to a new country and a new family, yet still nursing his hatred of everything British, Declan is befriended by his cousins and a classmate. Finally, he is comes to understand the futility of the violence in his homeland and realizes how attached to his new life he has become. Fast-paced action opens the novel and immediately engages readers. Contemporary language and vivid description add to the sense of reality and enhance the easily readable style. Heneghan avoids arguments on the rights or wrongs of the Irish conflict, focusing instead on the human issues: families destroyed and lives torn apart by terrorist warfare. A great title to booktalk.
Gail Richmond, San Diego Unified Schools, CA
Copyright 1994 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Gr. 7-10. "They handcuffed him to the seat so he could cause no trouble on the airplane." No further booktalk needed. The title, the cover, and the dramatic opening scenes will grab readers. At 13, Declan is wild and angry at being torn away from his home in Northern Ireland and forced to join his uncle's family in Canada. He wants to stay and fight with the IRA in the streets of Belfast and get bloody revenge for the deaths of his family: his mother and sister were blown up in a bomb attack; his father was shot dead years before. The story is satisfyingly predictable: we know that Declan will slowly become less rebellious and succumb to the love of his relatives and to the wild beauty of the coastal town near Vancouver. The moral is clear: violence solves nothing. That lesson's too heavily underlined at times, especially with the suddenly interposed revelation that Declan's father was not a hero, but an informer. However, readers will feel for the desperate boy nearly destroyed by civil war. The best scenes evoke his haunting memories of guns and firebombs and contrast those nightmares with the rich silence of the wilderness and the kindness of community. Hazel Rochman --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

A teenage terrorist, forcibly removed from Belfast, discovers that there's more to life than revenge. With his father shot down and his mother and sister killed by a car bomb, Declan believes he has nothing to hope for but vengeance, but his career is cut short when he's captured and, despite several desperate and clever attempts to escape, sent to his uncle Matthew in British Columbia. Declan is disgusted to learn that Matthew and his wife Kate are ``fixers'': gentle and peace-loving, the sort of people who adopt orphans and heal injured animals--but not Declan, he vows. He strikes a deal: He'll stop trying to get away and even go to school if, after three months, he can go back to Ireland. Declan is a credible, even a likable, character, shaped by his violent environment (demonstrating how he pelted British troops with nail- studded apples, he kills a squirrel and is genuinely surprised by witnesses' outrage) but not irredeemably hardened; in the end, the forest's quiet beauty and the pleasures of having a family again work in him the change of heart that appeals to morality and intellect could not. Heneghan gives glimpses of injustices perpetrated by every side in Northern Ireland, suggesting no easy cures but offering the insight that even some of the villains are victims. (Fiction. 11-14) -- Copyright ©1994, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

"This novel kept me entertained the entire time..." (The Alan Review 20040101)

"...a recommended read for the way it deals with the very real internal struggle to overcome violence as a way of life." (The Observer )

"Historically, this book is an eye-opener." (KLIATT )

Exiled from Ireland as a terrorist, Declan is sent to live with family in Canada. All he wants, though, is to return to the fight. (20030901)