The Amethyst Child

by Sarah Singleton

It's the summer holidays and Amber is bored. So when she meets non-conformist Dowdie, she is bowled over. Dowdie lives in a commune known as the Community, and gradually, Amber finds herself drawn into it. She discovers that Dowdie is an Amethyst child - a child with special talents unrecognised by normal society - and that her father, James, the leader of the commune, believes Amber is one too. Meanwhile Amber also meets Johnny, a gorgeous loner who shares her interest in photography. But Johnny is very dismissive of the Community, a place Amber now holds dear. Torn between Johnny and her friend Dowdie, Amber finds herself being drawn into a world of dark and dangerous secrets. Secrets which can only end in death and disillusionment.

Genres: Young Adult, Cults, Contemporary, Fantasy, Realistic Fiction

240 pages, Paperback

First published May 6, 2008

About the author

Sarah Singleton was born in Thornbury in 1966. She was educated at the University of Nottingham and has travelled in Europe, India and Nepal. She has two daughters, Fuchsia and Poppy.

She worked as a reporter for local weekly newspapers, including the Wiltshire Gazette & Herald, before becoming a writer and freelance journalist in 2007. A novella, In The Mirror (Enigmatic Novellas #4), was reprinted by Cosmos Books in 2001. Her first novel (for adults), The Crow Maiden, was published by Cosmos in 2000 and was short-listed for the IAFA Crawford Award. She has had short stories published in various magazines and anthologies, including Black Static, QWF magazine, Enigmatic Tales and Interzone.

Reviews

[R · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was in the fantasy section of the bookshop when I found it, and although it had no fantasy I was not disappointed in any way. This book was beautiful, down-to-earth and the ending was both satisfying and sad.
I would recommend this to anyone. It was beautifully written and well paced and overall a fantastic read.

[Clare Snow]

Written Aug 2008

"All balance is being destroyed. The Gulf Stream is dying and climate change will spread deserts over the face of the Earth. In just fifty years the age of oil will be over and the industrial machine will cease. Its death throes will be agonising. Without oil, modern agriculture will fail. In the coming decades we face endless war, disease and starvation – a terrible and unavoidable apocalypse."

I picked up this up thinking it was some girly fantasy, with its twining flowery vines in metallic purple. (The illustration is by Sarah Coleman who did the paperback covers of Holly Black’s Tithe: A Modern Faerie Tale and Ironside: A Modern Faerie Tale) I glanced at the blurb, but it didn’t really register that the story was about a cult. The cult in question is The Community, which believes the world as we know it is ending. Luckily the Amethyst Children are waiting in the wings to save the Earth. Amber is perfect fodder for a cult – with no friends at school and feeling no one understands her.

"I worry about everything. Climate change, the environment, war hunger terrorism. I worry about being hopeless. I worry that I am eating when other people are starving. I worry that I’m too weak and passive, that I don’t make a difference because I’m too scared."

The fact that two of the books I’ve recently read had environmental themes, which aren’t revealed in the blurb, heartens me. It seems as if these themes were slipped into the stories without a thought. Perhaps the authors knew exactly what they were doing and what would sell, but I’d like to think environmental themes have just become something to include in a story because they’re a part of life.

Before Amber meets the cult, her new found friend Dowdie (the cult’s bait) takes her on a tour of the English countryside where she lives, but never notices. This is setting up for the nature worship which permeates the Community’s beliefs. Not realising what this was leading to, I was just enjoying Sarah Singleton’s amazing descriptions of the natural world:

"The sun cast tiny molten jewels of light upon the ground through chinks in the leaves. This long arboreal cave possessed the architectural calm of a cloister in a cathedral."

Oh, to write like that! And then I was captivated by the descriptions of the sustainable farm the Community has going – with its chickens and raspberry canes, vegetable beds and orchard. I dream of living in such a place, not as a part of a cult, but somewhere that I worked on and brought to sustainability eg. Milkwood. Then there was the rubbish, obviously my new fav topic.

'Why did you do that? You mustn’t throw rubbish in the river!'
'Why not?' he said. 'The world’s full of rubbish. What does it matter, one bit more?'
'It does matter! The river’s beautiful.'
Johnny leaned back on his elbow, a lazy smile on his face. 'So what should I do? Put it in a bin, so someone else can stuff it in a big hole we’ve dug in the ground and bury it? The rubbish will still be there – it’s just that you won’t see it,' he said. 'The world’s a garbage heap. Might as well be honest about it.'

This exchange between Amber and Johnny (Amber’s not-brainwashed-by-the-cult friend) sparked a helpless stare from me to equal Amber’s. I hate littering, but putting our rubbish in the bin doesn’t make it go away, as much as we’d like to think it does. Or as much as we wished it went to a parallel Abcity, as in Un Lun Dun.

I had a little quibble: the ending was unrealistic and kind of trite. I'm not going to say why I thought this because I don’t want to give spoilers, but if you read it, you might work out what I’m talking about. And Amber telling a suicidally depressed person that he shouldn't kill himself because she would miss him, wouldn't work. He would need counselling and medical treatment, probably for an extended period of time. But these little things didn't detract too much from an enjoyable read.

After realising this wasn’t quite what I’d expected, I took a closer look at those twining vines on the cover. There’s the dragonfly mentioned in the story, but also a rat, some nasty earwig-like insects, eyes, splotches of blood and flowers with bullets for petals. (There’s also raspberries and love hearts in-between to lull you into a false sense of security.) Not so airy-fairy after all, but a thoughtful read with relevance to us all.

This is from my blog https://ockhamsrazor.wordpress.com/20...

[Beatrice · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fooled by the shiny, convoluted cover design and the hippie title, I picked up this The Amethyst child expecting a spooky read for Halloween week, but this book completely surprised me!

First of all (and I know this remark is boring and nobody cares about syntax and figures of speech) the writing style was wonderfully evocative, which is quite unusual for a book that by its very cover seems to appeal emo teens. I found myself captured by the beauty of metaphors and I found the dialogues very realistic.

Also, I loved the psychological complexity of the characters. Amber may be an unreliable narrator, but she's quite good at observation when it comes to her friends and family. The relationship between her and Dowdie reminded me of the one described in Marlena (and I low-key shipped them til Johnny arrived).

Why three stars then?
Because the plot of the last 50 pages was really rushed, and I would have preferred a more solid logic behind James's motivation and choices.
Also, Johnny suicidal behavior was completely out of the blue. Not inexplicable, but rushed as well.

In the end, an impressive debut for an author that was so new to me. I would try another of her books but Sarah Singleton seems to write paranormal books and it's not really my jam.

[Grace Lawson · Rating 3 out of 5]

As a young adult, this was my number one read. I adored the characters, and the realistic, descriptive style with which Singleton explored the impact of their different upbringings on their relationships.

[Chels M. · Rating 2 out of 5]

2'5 en realidad.

[Crimson 26 · Rating 5 out of 5]

A really interesting book that honestly kept me at the edge of my seat, I love it!

[Fiona · Rating 3 out of 5]

The Amethyst Child tells the story of Amber, a young girl of 15, who is an outcast. She doesn't really fit in anywhere, she doesn't have any friends and she's prepared to spend her summer alone. Until she meets Dowdie. Dowdie is a young girl who is home schooled and lives in the Community. She is everything that Amber wishes she was :confident, outgoing, brave. The two girls form an unusual friendship and Amber is gradually introduced into the Community : a group of people who live under a man called James. They share everything, they use barely any modern technology and everything is natural. They are completely cut off from the outside world, only communicating through an organic food store that they run and their website, advertising the 'faith'. They are a religious group that believe that the apocalypse is coming and that the 'Amethyst Children' (special children with powers such as telekinesis) are going to save them. The story is divided into two separate parts with alternating chapters, in a kind of before and after form. It starts with Amber talking to a detective in the Fall, after everything has happened and then we have the chapters from her point of view as she remembers everything that happened over the summer, how everything began.

I've actually read this book before, a few years ago, and I had completely forgotten about it until I was clearing my bookshelf out last week and I found it again. I remembered really enjoying it but I didn't remember the story at all and I was looking for something to read so I decided to give this book a go! All in all, I did enjoy reading this book. I thought the writing and style were really beautiful and everything flowed really nicely. I thought that there was great character development in Amber, the protagonist. The plot was interesting. I could definitely kind of see where it was going but there were aspects that I didn't predict so I guess there was that sort of element of surprise in the end. I thought the story on the whole was very believable, it seemed like it could have actually happened. What was fascinating for me, was the inside look at this cult and how
easily they manipulated this young girl. How one man convinced like 30 or so people in this 'Community', as it's called, that the apocalypse was coming and the Amethyst Children were going to save them. It really gave the reader a lot to think about, which I really liked.

All in all, I found this to be a very interesting read. Not a life changer, but definitely enjoyable.

[listerature · Rating 4 out of 5]

What a nice venture out of my comfort zone! I'm usually a dystopian-ish bookie (some realistic contemporaries)

I originally was attracted to this book due to the cover (shiny purple? yes please!), but when I took a glance at the blurb, I discovered it was CULTish. I don't do cult books. Honestly. I'm creeped out by them. They have this scary aura. This one kinda did as well. Dark colour scheme? (Black & Purple cover)

My class library had this book and it seemed so mysterious, I almost felt guilty borrowing this beauty.

"Cult & Contemporary?" I read, my face blank, my mind blank, I was completely blank, dumbfounded.

Disclaimer: It isn't a realistic contemporary.

The first chapter was enough to absorb me into it. It was executed almost-perfectly (except, nothing is perfect). Then came the double-time-period thing and WOAHHH. Even more did I invest myself in this wondrous book. 'cept I had lots of homework which interfered which the reading experience. Unpredictable throughout, brimming with its excellent suspense.

Then came the blooming friendship between Dowdie & Amber, learning about the Community, learning to love it. All went well until... the romance.

Oh, the horrible romance. At first, Amber seemed totally uninterested in her love interest. Moment she reaches home, she swoons. Wow. Even their meeting was awkward. What type of teen girl just follows a sixteen-year-old boy who she barely even knows, back to his home?

It was too obvious that the author was not a teen. It was anything but an adoloscent's voice. It could have been a ten-year old or a 30-year old person. The voice was yet too immature yet mature.

Also, emo's are cool?? Emos are often considered "the outcasts within the cliques" so why does it seem like they're revered dark-clothed kids?

[River Frey Wood · Rating 5 out of 5]

So it wasn't like the books I normally read. But that is good because when I had chosen to read this book, I was looking for change. It's in first person too, which was a plus side. As a book itself, it is very light and has a very beautiful cover.

I love how the chapter changes from the present to the past. And because of this, it did keep me on the edge of my chair. Since at times it did confuse me. This book does also show, how lonely it can be and how, when you find a place to belong, you don't want to leave. That is till you realize that it's just an illusion. Good lesson in life.

As for bad things about this book. Really didn't see any. I mean yes there was some spelling mistakes, but other than that. It was really interesting, even the whole story base. It just show how hard it can be for a teen to have to choose, and what the results would be, for those choices. As said before this book has a lot of lessons to teach a reader. And for me that is a way for the author to educate our generation.

[Abby Taylor · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved this book!
I actually read it some time ago, but since I am Neopagan by belief which is often seen as a 'cult' itself, reading a cult inspired book from the views of someone being brought into it as an outsider, looking for a sense of purpose was refreshing. It was a brilliant take on some rather adult subjects. Gripping, energising and the ability to make aware of yourself and the world... a brilliant read.

[Lore · Rating 3 out of 5]

One fo the best books out there about a girl called amber who befriends a girl called dowdie who claims to be an amethyst chilnd and amber is one too. This book is great. I loved the endign even thouhg its told in two differnt times while its happenign and after it happens.I slowly put it together and become amazed at what happends.

[Jill London · Rating 3 out of 5]

Lushly painted and atmospheric read. Had some genuinely interesting things to say about perspectives and differing points of view, and how reality is essentially a kind of democracy, being what we all, as a society, agree on. Good characterization and very few slow points in the narrative which is a valuable plus! I would recommend it.

[Emilie · Rating 4 out of 5]

We had to read this for school and it defenitly leads to a lot of thinking.I thought it was great, but very depressing. I cried a lot. Very disturbing.
We got to meet the author, which was interesting.

[Light · Rating 5 out of 5]

Its intense and so realistic. It reminds me of the Children Of Wacko. It really pulls you into the feeling of being in a cult. And shows why and how people believe what their leaders say.

[Regina · Rating 5 out of 5]

I loved how close I felt to the main character. This book haunted me long after I finished it.

[Eris · Rating 3 out of 5]

I bought it at a school book fair because the cover of the book astounded me but it turned to be a waste of money. The book failed to interest me in anyway while reading this book

[Aoife Costello · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was a breath of fresh air. Never read a book about a cult before so it was an eye opener.

[Hannah · Rating 5 out of 5]

Amazing, very gripping book with some amazing characters and twists within

[Pinch Of Sarah · Rating 4 out of 5]

I loved this book, it was a bit slow starting but soon picks up its pace and eventually I couldn't put it down til is finished.