Seven chilling novels with young people taking charge of their lives

Marie Tierney was a finalist in the Daily Mail First Novel competition. When she isn’t researching criminal history, she writes plays and poetry. Born and raised in Birmingham, England, Tierney dedicated almost twenty years to working in education before becoming a full-time writer. She lives in East Anglia with her husband and son.

Tierney's new novel is Deadly Animals.

At CrimeReads the author tagged seven books that "feature young people who have taken responsibility for their own lives when the adults around them have abandoned or betrayed them." One title on the list:

The Girl Who Loved Tom Gordon by Stephen King

This is a psychological horror of nine-year-old girl Trish who is separated from her squabbling family during a forest hike and has to learn quickly how to survive on her scant provisions. All the while, she listens to a baseball game on her Walkman which features her favourite player Tom Gordon and it is through listening to the games she gains enough strength to carry on even though she is hopelessly lost, starving and becoming very ill. As the days pass, and a police search ensues, Trish often hallucinates and is sure that something evil is following her. She believes it is the God of The Lost, a confrontation with whom she is resigned to face.

I loved this book, and I appreciated Trisha’s realistic mistakes made while she comes to terms that has to survive in the wilderness.

Read about the other entries on the list.

--Marshal Zeringue