It’s a cold, frosty night when five children aged twelvish, flee an orphanage – the only home they’ve ever known. They are not only fleeing a wicked woman called Matron Gassbeek, there are strangers looking to adopt them. This is what they’ve wanted their entire lives, but an overheard deal being made has urged them to run.

All five children were left on the steps of the orphanage in strange baskets or containers, and wrapped in things that flouted the Matron’s strict rules. This has attracted her wrath ever since.

Left behind on the roof of the orphanage in a velvet blanket, with her name stitched in white, Milou is the only one among them who believes her parents left her behind for an important reason. Her vivid imagination helps her fill her Theories Journal with many scenarios, and it also helps her settle everyone at night with her stories.

Milou takes the lead in their escape, determined to follow a strange clue she has found, using the maths and engineering skills of Lotta, the map skills of Egbert, and the combined courage of them all.  They find a strange home, but no one is in it. Again, she searches for clues, building new scenarios of why she was left behind as a baby. She has always had a strange danger radar – a tingling in her ears. The others laugh at this quirk of hers, but Milou follows these feelings – saving them more than once.

It’s all very well having a place to stay, but the neighbours are beginning to look suspicious, the closest the most of all. And it doesn’t help that she is a local warden. The sewing skills of Sem save the day, using the tools and swathes of material left in a workroom. Now they need money for food, and again, a combined effort helps – but not as much as they’d hoped. Still, it’s better than being in the Little Tulip Orphanage that looked homely from the outside, but was a home of horror within.

Milou is still consumed by the need to find her parents, but this preoccupation comes with almost disastrous consequences. Another of the orphans has his own hopes and dreams of a family, and when he sees an opportunity to seek them out he grabs it.

The orphans fight for their freedom, facing a corrupt adoption scam, a vicious dog, a blazing fire and the depths of a filthy canal. Where are Milou’s parents? Why did they leave her behind? Who is the warden next door? All is finally revealed.

One of the words used for this story is Unforgettable, and it truly is. It may have orphans, and the cliche terrible matron, but the plot and conclusion takes you this way and that. Just when the characters find a solution to a problem, another problem rises to face them. Their own quirks and skills are brought to the problem and they all develop and grow in some way throughout the narrative.

The Unadoptables is a mystery with loyalty, family (even without a cell of shared DNA), and the joy of being extraordinary in your own way. The baddies are truly bad, and the children their own rulers of fate, not relying on any adult to solve their problems. Each chapter begins with an illustration, and journal entries are scattered through the story as the main character ponders her clues.

The historical settings of Amsterdam’s canals and streets were easily imagined and the ending was unpredictable and wonderful at the same time. A mystery of family, orphans, courage and puppets!

Really enjoyed it.

Author – Hanna Tooke

Illustrator – Ayesha L Rubio

Age – 8+

Read a review of another great novel by this author (Click on the Cover)

(2020, Penguin, Orphans, Matron, Fear, Hunger, Escape, Freedom, Cooperation, Family, Grief, Secret, Clues, Mystery, Puppets, Theatre, Evil, Sinister, Amsterdam, Slavery, Blended Family, Canals, Holland, Historical, Windmill, Amsterdam)