Absolutely wonderful and modern book for YA! I loved this story, it was such a unique viewpoint to have the main character blind, and understanding the ways that the world isn't designed for people with visual impairments. The county lines plotline was so timely and scary. Highly recommend this book!

This was a brilliant read and one that really stuck with me. The writing was beautiful and it was so interesting to see the story from the perspective of someone struggling with blindness. Really interesting and well written read!

I don't know why Penny Joelson isn't more well known, I think her books are fantastic. I was nervous this book wouldn't meet the heights of I Have No Secrets, but it definitely does. She writes about disability with such matter-of-factness. Her characters are fully formed independent agents, informing the reader and challenging stereotypes in equal measure whilst presenting a taut plot and gripping mystery. Whilst the MC is visually impaired, unlike in traditional "issue reads" the eye is more closely drawn to social issues such as childhood neglect, family breakdown and "cuckooing", all suffered by able-bodied secondary characters. The romance feels genuine and normal, which shouldn't be unusual but still is. The murder is genuinely shocking, focusing the plot around the mystery. Quick and satisfying to read, I highly recommend it.

I love books that have what is seen as diverse characters. What I don’t like about books is that people are often seen as being diverse characters. Confused? Let me explain. Things The Eye Can’t See is the story of Libby and how she gets embroiled in a mystery which she then has to help solve to save her friends. So far so normal as plots go. The diverse factor is that Libby is partially sighted.

This rant is not against Penny Joelson, if anything Penny Joelson is part of the solution and not part of the problem. Disability is seen as diversifying a character rather than seen as the norm. What Joelson does fantastically well in Things The Eye Can’t See is address some of the preconceptions about visual impairment which often lead to prejudices. It isn’t seen as “normal” for a visually impaired character be able to solve a crime mystery. It is due to this fact that Joelson should really get more credit for her writing.

Besides the disability factor Things The Eye Can’t See is a great story of the difficulties of growing up. About how friendships can drift when boys come and go. How school life can be difficult. How people come from different socio-economic backgrounds. All of this is wrapped up in the terrifying bow of gang culture and crime. What more could you want from a story?

I really enjoyed reading Things The Eye Can’t See. Joelson accurately captures the voice of the teenager. The worries that they have and the inability to admit that they need help from a grown up. She really has managed to capture something special with this novel.

Things the Eye Can’t See by Penny Joelson is available now.

For more information regarding Penny Joelson (@pennyjoelson) please visit www.pennyjoelson.co.uk.

For more information regarding Electric Monkey (@EMTeenFiction) please visit the Twitter page.

Clever storyline again from Penny Joelson - dealing with a girl losing her sight and the added risk in county lines

I'm going to start this by saying, I'm so upset I got accepted for this book and wasn't quick enough to download it. I did however get another copy of this book when published so I could read it, so I thought I'd feedback anyway. I love Penny Joelson's work, I love that her books tackle things that usually aren't deal with very well by other authors or are completely left out of the YA space and how she incorporates those difficulties with mystery elements and so forth. I enjoyed this story with it's twists and turns and how Libby is growing in her independence throughout the story. The story followed incredibly naturally and I loved Samson.

Fascinating central character in Libby, and the descriptions of her attempts to become more independent living with her visual impairment were interesting. I liked the relationship between Libby and her parents, and the differences in attitude between her mother and her father's approach to her developing independence.

But ultimately I felt like there wasn't enough emotional exploration - the plot revolves around a very hard hitting subject, and Libby and her friends experience some very traumatic events, but there isn't really much depth to those scenes.

An interesting premise - Libby has a visual impairment, and inadvertently gets involved in a mystery when she's asked to pass a note to a fellow student. With plenty of intrigue and a great protagonist, this was an enjoyable read.

This is a really good read, with a difference.

Libby is sight impaired and has a guide dog, Samson. The book beautifully describes her challenges and frustrations as a young adult living with a disability and I learned so much from her descriptions. She’s also pulled into a mystery when a boy she knows from school hands her a note for another pupil and then disappears. What follows is a good YA drama / mystery and it kept me sufficiently interested throughout. However, I did find it a slow, somewhat plodding read at times, but, having said that, I was sufficiently invested in the various characters to keep reading.

Strong 3*

Thanks to NetGalley and the publishers for the opportunity to preview.

‘Things The Eye Can’t See’ is a YA mystery book about a visually impaired girl called Libby who is thrust into the role of searching for a missing boy. Libby, her guide dog Samson and her new friend Kyle go on a search looking for the missing boy but the search leads them to uncovering a lot of dark secrets.

This book was so action packed and had me hooked from the first chapter. I flew through it so quickly because I needed to know what was going to happen next and to uncover the mystery of what actually happened to the missing boy.

The friendship between Libby and Kyle was so sweet. My favourite aspect of this book was the relationship between Libby and Samson. Although Samson is her guide dog (and obviously does not talk) you can still see the strong connection and the love between them.

I did feel like this book had some unnecessary parts, for example right near the end of the book, someone posts a hurtful picture online of Libby on her phone and makes a comment about how she is faking the fact that she is visually impaired. This is brought up for maybe one chapter and then completely forgotten about and it felt a little unnecessary to the book.

Overall, this book was a strong YA mystery book that I devoured in one sitting as I could not put it down. I would definitely check out some more of Penny Joelson’s books in the future.

Things the Eye Can't See is a strong and powerful read that wonderfully shines the light on sight impairment and how it doesn't stop people, especially the young female protagonist, living their lives to the fullest. An engaging page-turner that is an absolutely wonderful read.

Things the Eye Can't See follows Libby, a girl with a sight impairment, as she is inadvertently wrapped up in solving a mystery - where is Charlie? And why did he hand her a note that said someone was trying to kill him?

I found the premise interesting - I like reading young adult mysteries, and this was a story that dealt with some serious aspects of poverty, youth delinquency, and how vulnerable these children are. The aspect that was really interesting to read about was Libby, a protagonist who, for the most part, has a sight impairment. She can't really see things unless magnified, blown up on her phone, or held really close to her face. While investigating this mystery, Libby learns about how to be more independent and push at the boundaries of her own comfort zone.
As a reader, you are given an insight into what it is like to be someone with a vision impairment and how others treat these people. It's very rare to read a story with a character like this so it was good to be able to experience that.
However, because of this, there are limitations. As Libby can't see details, the descriptions of the world, of what is going on around Libby, is incredibly sparse, tending to only be when Libby is painting or taking pictures. This means that the world is as distant to the reader as it may be to Libby. This, combined with a first-person present-tense perspective, means that there is a lot of telling, not showing. Although visuals may have been out, it was still possible to focus on emotions in a way that wasn't quite done in the story. For example, there are lot of times where we are told that Libby is worried but this could very easily have been shown from how her body is reacting. The combination of the character and the choice of tense/point of view means that this is not the most engrossing or emotive of reads.

I enjoyed reading the mystery and gaining an insight into Libby's life was something I really enjoyed. I just wish there was more to the crafting of the story.

A fantastic mystery with a twist or two. As well as tackling some hard hitting subjects this was a very enjoyable read. The main character Libby is registered blind and uses the help of a guide dog but this doesn’t stop her from being a strong, powerful lead character. It’s great to see a disabled person in such a leading role and although her sight impacts the events in the story, it is easy to see her life isn’t just about her disability. It was great to see Libby learning how to take her own lead in life and grow in confidence. The book also focuses on gang culture, missing people and murder. There are many twists that keep the book interesting to the very end. Such a great read from start to finish.