“Without you, Kay-Kay, there’s no sun, no warmth, no light. I will find you – my brother, my friend. I will find you and bring you back.”

When Lena’s beloved older brother goes missing at the end of summer camp, the bottom drops out of Lena’s world. The police dismiss Kay-Kay’s disappearance as that of just another teenage runaway, but Lena knows they are wrong. Tired of not being listened to, powerless to reach her parents through their grief and unable to imagine a future without her brother in it, Lena sets off to find him.

As Lena journeys across India to retrace Kay-Kay’s last known steps, she embarks on a parallel journey of discovery. Because it seems there is a side to Kay-Kay she has never known. The more she learns about her brother in the weeks leading up to his disappearance, the more determined Lena is to find him – and to finally be the sister he has so clearly needed. But will she be too late…?

After being at summer camp, teenager Karthik (Kay-Kay) goes missing on the train journey home. His parents are frantically worried and put their hopes into the local police locating him. Kay-Kay’s younger sister Lena isn’t so trusting in the police given that they think he’s just runaway.

With the police doing the bare minimum, her mother retreating into herself and sleeping each day away, and her father back at work, Lena decides it is up to her to discover the truth and find her brother.

Bringing Back Kay-Kay is a beautifully written middle-grade book that is set in India and focuses on the tough subject of a missing child. The book flows well and the characters are gracefully portrayed. Lena is an inquisitive young girl who is close to her older brother and will do anything to find him. She will leave no stone unturned in her quest.

This is a story that will touch your heart and have you hoping that Kay-Kay is okay and that Lena can find him, alive. The narrative takes the reader on an adventure and features some poetry along the way. This style works superbly and gives the reader a more vivid picture of who Kay-Kay is.

Overall, Bringing Back Kay-Kay is a poignant and captivating story that will hold you to the pages for the entirety and suck you into Lena’s hell and her determination to locate her brother.

Dev grew up in a sleepy hamlet near Mumbai where she read obsessively, wrote furtively and daydreamed endlessly. She won the Commonword Diversity YA novel prize in 2018 and went on to gain an MA in Writing for Young People at Bath Spa University. She lives in London with her family.