By Cameron & Brown
Publisher: David Fickling Books
ISBN: 9781910200773
I think what’s consistently interesting about all of these collected editions from The Phoenix comic is that the story concepts are daringly different as opposed to the less risky re-treading of ground with characters and scenarios that we’ve seen before. And with Tamsin And The Deep we get another helping of creativity as we follow a young West Country girl and her family’s dark relationship with the sea.
Tamsin’s brother is supposed to be teaching her how to use her board upon the waves, but he’d rather be having fun with his friends out in the surf while she’s sat on the sand. So Tamsin decides to take matters into her own hands and paddle out on her own, except she goes a little further than she should, is pounded by a large breaking wave, and has a close encounter with something beneath the surface.
She wakes on the shoreline many miles from where she went under and, using some driftwood she has clung to as a crutch, makes her way home, finally arriving to a mum and brother who have presumed her dead – Tamsin has been missing for a month. And then things get even stranger.
The driftwood that Tamsin clutched so tightly to is far more interesting than it appears, while the creature she met beneath the waves has a much more sinister agenda set for Tamsin’s family. Tamsin has stumbled upon something ancient and bitter, and it’s now down to her to put things right.
There’s something almost Stan Lee about the creation of Tamsin’s abilities, which I rather liked. A simple yet effective set-up that brings the inevitable great power/great responsibility statement, but done with such a modern twist that you can’t help but grin at it. Cameron and Brown manage to embrace the West Country setting and the magical mythology that so pervades it, giving us a modern female hero in Tamsin that you’ll be rooting for.
An excellent tale for kids, and one adults should enjoy too.
And if you liked that: Check out www.thephoenixcomic.co.uk for more great books
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