"This inclusive closed-room adventure brims with empathy and pertinent environmental themes."
July 2025 Book of the Month
Conjuring an un-put-down-able brew of climate-change impact and unlikely friendship bonds, Polly Ho-Yen’s When the Storm Comes comes especially recommended for 9+-year-olds who love school-centred stories and adventures that inspire them to imagine “what if that actually happened?”
Mali is a small boy who encounters big problems when he starts a new school, beginning with having his real name (Amaryllis) mocked by Petey, a bully with “piggy eyes”. After bonding with a boy called Shiyoon, his move to America leaves Mali adrift again, until he decides to continue creating the comic he and Shiyoon had started, and joins the school book club.
Then, after weeks of unusual rain, a storm sees the book clubbers trapped in the library, with all means of communication cut off, and the road outside transformed into an unpassable river that was “getting deeper and deeper, silently surrounding the school, like a cobra coiling around its prey”. At the same time, Mali observes that Petey felt the same to him, “dangerous and building”, like the rising water. Such is the way Ho-Yen shares her themes, with characters’ emotional states evoked in visceral, relatable ways that reflect the novel’s broader-stroke picture — as the weather becomes wilder, so the characters’ emotional state becomes yet more turbulent.
Utterly gripping as the group strive to survive flooding, lack of food, and a very unexpected drama that sees them work together through understanding each other better, When the Storm Comes amounts to a story that’s suffused in empathy, kindness and courage as it imparts valuable insights into environmental topics — while there’s no Planet B, we can, to quote Mali, “rise together, unafraid, unapologetic, undaunted to stand up for change”. Stirring stuff!
The storm had been brewing for weeks. When I look back and remember those days of dripping rain, the thick grey cloud blanketing the sky, the rolling thunder, I wonder how we didn’t see it coming. We didn’t realise it was building into something. Back then, we just thought it was stormy weather. We had no idea what lay ahead. We couldn’t ever have imagined how it would engulf us.
| Suitable For: | |
| Other Genres: | |
| Recommendations: |
the best books for 9-12 year olds · the best books for teenagers
The storm had been brewing for weeks. When I look back and remember those days of dripping rain, the thick grey cloud blanketing the sky, the rolling thunder, I wonder how we didn’t see it coming.
The LoveReading4Kids Editorial Team have read and reviewed When the Storm Comes and determined it is suitable for children aged 9-12 years old
When the Storm Comes features in the following genres: Featured Books for 9+ readers, Featured Books for 11+ readers, Recommendations, Star Books, School Stories, Science Fiction, Ecological and Environmental Interest - Non Fiction, Personal Social Health Economic (PSHE), Children's and Young Adult Fiction, Children’s, Teenage and Educational, Children’s / Teenage: Social issues / topics
Paperback. Not Available.
When the Storm Comes was written by Polly Ho-Yen and published by Knights Of
When the Storm Comes has 228 pages
