Shy by Max Porter

‘Shy’ is a novel about guilt, rage, imagination, and boyhood. It is about being lost in the dark, and realising you are not alone. It is the story of a few strange hours in the life of a troubled teenage boy. You mustn’t do that to yourself Shy. You mustn’t hurt yourself like that. He is wandering into the night listening to the voices in his head: his teachers, his parents, the people he has hurt and the people who are trying to love him. Got your special meds, nutcase? He is escaping Last Chance, a home for ‘very disturbed young men’, and walking into the haunted space between his night terrors, his past and the heavy question of his future.