Bear
By (Author) Kiri LIGHTFOOT
Allen & Unwin
A&U Children's NZ
4th March 2025
New Zealand
Young Adult
Fiction
Childrens / Teenage personal and social topics: Physical and mental health condi
Childrens / Teenage personal and social topics: First / new experiences and grow
Childrens / Teenage fiction: Family and home stories
Childrens / Teenage fiction: Relationship stories
Childrens / Teenage personal and social topics: School, education and teachers
Winner of Winner 2024 (New Zealand)
Paperback
368
Width 153mm, Height 234mm
446g
Thirteen-year-old Jasper Robinson-Woods is not okay - his name is too long, he never sees his dad and he can't sleep because of a terrifying nightmare. Oh, and to top it off, his goldfish is dying. Jasper is overwhelmed with bad thoughts; are they a sign of disaster to come
Things go from bad to worse when his mother announces her annoying boyfriend is moving in, and his absent father wants to take him on another disappointing road trip. The only place Jasper feels safe is in the tree in his front yard.
But then the unimaginable happens: his nightmare comes to life causing everything to spiral out of control. Jasper risks losing the people he cares about and decides it's finally time to face his nightmare and who it really is.
In doing so, Jasper learns that even when you hit rock bottom, you never know what, and who, is around the corner.
Kiri Lightfoot is an NZ-based author and actor. She has worked as a scriptwriter in children's television and as an actor both for theatre and screen. She continues to work part-time in television and also runs poetry reading sessions in aged-care homes and hospitals with charity 'Active Arts'. Kiri worked for many years as a telephone counsellor with Youthline and as a volunteer mentor in an alternative education school. Bear is her first novel for young adults and was inspired by working with young people at this time. Kiri is now a mother of three school-aged children and lives in central Auckland. Her previous books are picture books: Ming's Iceberg, illustrated by Kimberly Andrews (Scholastic 2021) and Every Second Friday, illustrated by Ben Galbraith (Hodder Children's Books 2008), a shortlist in the New Zealand Post Children's Book Awards 2009.