Drift by Pip Harry

Title: Drift

Author: Pip Harry

Genre: YA Contemporary/verse novel

Publisher: Hachette Australia/Lothian

Published: 30^th July 2025

Format: Paperback

Pages: 312

Price: $17.99

Synopsis: A beautifully written verse novel that will resonate with younger teen readers who are beginning to understand themselves and the changing world they live in.

Fourteen-year-old Nate has just moved back to Australia and is finding it hard to navigate a new city, school and changed home life. His next-door neighbour, Luna, is dealing with her own issues: a viral video, friends who have dropped her, and a subsequent anxiety disorder.

When a swarm of 20,000 bees unexpectedly settle in the walls of Nate's family's house, Nate and Luna come together to save the hive, befriending local beekeeper Tyler. Over the course of one summer, their loyalties will be tested and their lives will be forever changed.

A topical, hopeful and authentic coming-of-age story that will captivate young teen readers, from multi-award-winning children's author Pip Harry.

~*~

Nate and his mum, Amber, have just moved back to Sydney from Singapore just before the last term of year nine is about to start. He’s struggling to navigate a new home, a new school, and a changed home life – where his mum is struggling with a back injury and waiting for surgery. And his dad is back in Singapore, trying to wrap up his job to come home and be with his family.

His neighbour, Luna, is dealing with anxiety after a viral video changed her life. She’s lost all her friends, her brother no longer speaks to her, and she’s grappling with terrible anxiety, unable to speak to anyone about what happened. Until she meets Nate and they bond over the bees that have invaded his home. Nate and Luna get to know local beekeeper Tyler, who is helping Nate move the bees.

The novel is told over a summer of friendship and loyalty, where everyone grapples to understand each other, and where at times, those loyalties will be tested.

Drift is a coming-of-age novel, where two fourteen-year-olds are navigating year nine, being fourteen and new lives, the changes that inevitably come with moves or changes in friendship dynamics, and the overarching effects of being in high school in today’s world. Nate and Luna are dealing with climate change crises in a post-COVID world, where there are lots of uncertainties in their lives. Luna is the first person that Nate meets, and he slowly gets to know her. He can be himself around her – almost. He still needs to deal with the move, with his dad’s absence, and with the fact that he’s doing everything around the home and still go to school because his mu can’t do much with her back injury.

The bees connect Luna and Nate, who are determined to keep them alive and start a beehive in the garden. But there’s a dark secret that Luna doesn’t want Nate to know. He’s the only person who hasn’t seen the video that has forced her into being an outcast at school. So much of what they go through revolves around their anxieties as they navigate difficult times. Pip Harry’s use of the verse novel works well here, bringing Nate and Luna’s interior worlds to life. It’s as though their concerns and anxieties are easier to talk about in verse and their worlds come to life in the complex simplicity as Nate and Luna are navigating new ways of living and being in the world.

It’s their friendship that I think is the most powerful aspect of their relationship. Nate wants to protect Luna, to be her friend no matter what and accepts her wholeheartedly. He doesn’t see her the way other people see her, and knows that going through tough things in life doesn’t define you. Even when it feels like it does. These characters are flawed and sympathetic, the kind of characters who make a story evolve from first to last page, and the verse novel format made me feel like we were seeing them for who they really were.

I have been seeing a few young adult novels lately that seem to be featuring younger teens, and this is great, because it is such a broad readership. I think the young adult novels that grapple with secrets, families, friends, and friendships can be the most powerful ones of all. Even as an adult reader, I get the sense that the themes young adult books explore are universal. This universality makes them attractive to a broader readership, and the more I read, the more I feel like authors are trying to portray as many diverse voices and experiences as possible.

The emotion in this book is heartfelt, and captures the teen experience of changes in many areas of your life. Changes that are shocking or hard to deal with at first, and they’re amplified as a teen, often because it can be the first time you might be dealing with big moves, fractured friendships or having to take care of parents and being more responsible than you thought you would be at a young age. This is what makes Drift such a powerful book. It’s quiet and loud in all the right ways. It gives us two unique voices who get to speak without being lost to the crowd. And they’re characters I wanted to follow. Characters that readers will relate to in different ways. It has all the characteristics that can make young adult novels so powerful and relatable to a wide range of readers.

I love verse novels – there’s something special about them that makes them accessible to all readers, and can help reluctant readers or those facing challenges engage with fabulous books, and for readers who will devour anything, they can make a nice change from walls of text, and are a nice palate cleanser if you’ve been reading lots of heavy books. The themes might be the same as a prose book, but the themes are dealt with so carefully and sensitively, that they evolve into a complex story that anyone can understand. It’s a delightful book that I hope many readers will enjoy.