The best thriller I've read all year... fast-paced, fascinating and heart-stoppingly exciting

Spine-tinglingly frightening... it hits the bull's eye from the word go

Fresh and original... perfectly captures the claustrophobic horror of a rural community in crisis... absolutely compelling - and deliciously scary

Excellent... plotted and written with panache, with high marks for characterisation and shock value... an absorbing, scary tale

The same rich vein of fatty tissue dissected by Patricia Cornwell... but Beckett does it well; he is a fine writer with a good grip of both the architacture and mechanics of the thriller... a classy debut

Terrifying... rarely have the mechanics of suspense been so efficiently utilised outside a Hitchcock movie

In the mould of Patricia Cornwell, but by a Brit... brilliant

Very distinctive... a cut above the average, with a convincing central character, a gripping plot and a fine store of morbid information

A gruesome forensic mystery... has the makings of an intriguing series

A cool talent... and evokes a creeping atmopshere of dread

Truly deserves the description "a real page-turner"

A deservedly acclaimed read.

A fascinating, funny and memorable read

The clash between Christopher's view of the world and the way it looks to the rest of us makes this an extraordinarily moving, often blackly funny read. It is hard to think of anyone who would not be moved and delighted by this book, so the decision to publish it simultaneously for older children and adults is certainly well-founded

A wonderful first person narrative of a boy with Asperger's Syndrome; funny, sad and extraordinarily original

I'm all for hearing different voices in fiction and I got my wish with this book. The story showed just how someone with Asperger's might view the world. Christopher finds a dead dog and sets about trying to find the dog's killer, but the book is much more than a mystery story... I loved the way Christopher tries to bring order to his world by using Maths which he finds far easier to understand than people

So genuine...It is chillingly heartbreaking and passionately positive in equal measure

So what makes these different to any other set of classics? In a moment of inspiration Random House had the bright idea of actually asking Key stage 2 children what extra ingredients they could add to make children want to read. And does it work? Well, put it this way...my 13-year-old daughter announced that she had to read a book over the summer holiday and, without any prompting, spotted The Boy in the Striped Pyjamas...and proceeded to read it! Now, if you knew my 13-year-old daughter, you would realise that this is quite remarkable. She reads texts, blogs and tags by the thousand - but this is the first book she has read since going to high school, so all hail Vintage Classics!