Finding the Fox

Finding the Fox

Author	Ali Sparkes
Illustrator	David Wyatt
Language	English
Series	The Shapeshifter
Genre	Fantasy/Science Fiction
Publisher	Oxford University Press
Publication date	2006
Publication place	England
Pages	328
Preceded by	None
Followed by	Running the Risk

Finding the Fox is a fantasy/science fiction novel by Ali Sparkes. It is the first book in The Shapeshifter series, and was first published in 2006 by Oxford University Press.

Major characters

• Daxesh "Dax" Jones - The book's principal protagonist. Dax is a teenage boy of Bangladeshi descent (on his Mother's side), who lives with his abusive stepmother Gina, and her daughter Alice. On a day that he had been locked outside in the yard by Gina, he becomes accidentally trapped in their garden shed; Because of high temperatures within it, he becomes desperate and opens a lemonade bottle filled with white spirit, which causes him to pass out. When he wakes, he discovers he possesses the power of Shapeshifting. Dax has brown eyes, dark hair, olive skin and when he is first introduced, he is described as pale and sickly from the abuse he has suffered. Once at Tregarren for a little while, however, he finds himself brighter, happier and with a healthy colour to his skin.
• Clive - Before and during the beginning of the series, before Dax relocates to Tregarren, Clive is Dax's best friend who he is faithfully protective of. Clive is a brilliantly intelligent boy who endures consistent bullying from two other boys at school (Matthew Spacey and Toby Rodgers) for how he behaves and looks; Who Dax shapeshifts to protect and take care of after a particularly brutal beating and destruction of a paper clock he had made. After this, the bullies leave Clive alone entirely. He is initially wary of Dax once he accurately deduces he is a shapeshifter, as he at first believes Dax to be a skinwalker. However, he does not believe Dax to be malicious, and soon trusts him again despite the fact Dax had to leave for Tregarren. The two often exchanged letters, wherein one of them, Clive attaches a news clipping written by Caronline Fisher, calling Dax the Beast of Barks End, a play on The Beast of Bodmin. He's described in the book as being small, speaking with a very posh accent and unintentionally dressing in a posh way also; Wearing fitted V-neck sweaters, ties and a well-pressed shirt and pair of trousers.
• (Agent) Owen Hind - Dax's friend, teacher and father figure. Owen is a government official who helps to find and retrieve new Colas and bring them to Tregarren. When Dax meets Owen, he initially introduces himself as a member of the education department, though it is revealed to Dax soon after that this is not true. Owen captures Dax on the way to school in the back of a truck, then uses a potent vapour on Dax called the Triple-Eight; "A concoction designed to bring about extreme terror and brief unconsciousness." as described by Owen, in order to force Dax to Shapeshift. Soon after, however, Owen apologises to Dax, as he only needed to use it in order to be sure Dax was a COLA - a Child Of Limitless Ability. Once Dax is brought to Tregarren, it is revealed that Owen teaches woodwork and outdoors survival skills. Owen also is the teacher for Dax's one-on-one "Development" classes, where he attempts to help Dax to use his Shapeshifting powers at will. Owen tries using relaxation hypnosis and cognitive behavioural therapy, in order to help Dax release his emotional repression due to his abuse and absent father. He is a mysterious, yet kind man who Dax comes to see as a parental figure. Owen is tall, well built, good-looking and his eyes being the most piercing blue Dax had ever seen; As well as having shoulder-length dark hair. His skin is tanned and that of an outdoorsman, and he is described as having a slight West-Country accent. Though he's in a suit when Dax first meets him, it's detailed that it looks unfitting on him; Instead, Owen wears outdoorsman clothes, such as a green thick-weave shirt, khaki jeans and boots.
• Gideon "Gid" Reader - Dax's best friend when he travels to Tregarren College; A fair-haired, freckled telekinetic. Gideon enjoys football and is on a team called the Tregarren Tigers, and has a penchant for chocolate of all kinds, which he buys from the local Chocolate Parlour in Polgammon. Somehow, no matter how much chocolate he eats, Gideon never seems to gain weight. He is a confident, well-meaning yet somewhat insensitive boy proven by the first meeting he and Dax had, where Gideon was floating a football over Dax's head while he was sleeping, and dropped it on him by mistake; As well as giving Dax a Chinese Burn on his arm in order to demonstrate Mia Cooper's healing abilities. His powers first manifested at home in front of his father, where he had levitated cutlery onto the ceiling.
• Lisa Hardman - A tough, somewhat spoiled rich girl who hates being at Tregarren and the Cola Club, so she avoids interaction with the other students. Lisa's hair is long and blonde, layered fashionably which she often ties up into a ponytail; She is pretty, wears fashionable clothes, and Dax describes her as "Looking like something out of a television advert for washing powder or fizzy drinks, except she wasn't smiling". Despite Lisa's attitude, she and Dax become friends when Dax discovers her crying in a small cave on the school grounds that they name The Crying Place. Dax tries to reach out to her, though respects her privacy when he is asked to leave her alone, which she in turn respects by warning him to duck to avoid an oncoming football; It is revealed that Lisa possesses extremely strong psychic powers, such as dowsing, spirit communication, premonition and telepathy but refuses to accept them or be trained how to use them, causing her to be constantly tormented by visions and various other paranormal communication. In order to escape this for a time, Lisa engages herself with cross country running and equestrian sport.
• Mia Cooper - A gifted healer, who has a strange effect on people who she has just met; When people come into contact with Mia for the first time, they tend to be enraptured by her, however this wears off over time. In the book, Gideon calls this the Mia Effect, much to Mia's chagrin; She is very appreciative when the Mia Effect is joked about, as she finds it very embarrassing. Mia is kind, caring and gentle, with a beautiful smile, as well as being a vegetarian which many of the healers at Tregarren are. Her physical appearance is described as being rather plain, with a pale face and unremarkable brown hair cut into a short bob. Mia has thick eyelashes and violet blue eyes, which hold a patience and knowledge beyond her years, as well as having a low, soft voice that is lovely and calming. Though Mia is potentially the strongest healer at Tregarren, in the first book she often takes on more than she can bear; Unable to release the pain that she had been taking off of others until eventually she collapses and is hospitalised for a time.
• Paulina Satre - The primary dowser of all COLAs, Paulina is intelligent, caring, kind, yet somewhat unsettling as Dax finds on his first meeting with her when she has a vision. Paulina is French and speaks with an accent. She is responsible for finding all the COLAs with her strong psychic and empathetic abilities, which help her to see and predict events as they transpire, or shortly before. Paulina is the French teacher at Tregarren College, and eventually becomes its principal by the end of the book. Ms Satre is described as being a graceful older woman, with grey eyes and spectacles. She has pale auburn hair swept into a low knot at the base of her neck and usually wears grey or black folds of wool, with an amber stone on a chain around her neck.
• Caroline Fisher - Caroline is a shrewd news reporter, affiliated with the Messenger. She is described as being small, slim, pretty with a neat blonde bob and wide grey eyes. She wears a short red dress with a white cardigan in order to look innocent and coax information out of people. Caroline shows up outside of Dax's home one afternoon, hiding behind a rhododendron bush and appearing from it before Dax can sense her. She forcibly coerces Dax to let her indoors, where she intently tries to get him to tell her about the attack at Bark's End. Dax is sarcastic to her, although it slips he is packing to move somewhere. Caroline uses this, and does some digging, despite at first thinking that there was nothing to this story, but now, using Dax's reaction, looks into it. She does some digging and finds that in sister papers, there were about reports of powerful children doing bizarre things; Levitating objects, dowsing, talking to the dead and even healing wounds. After interviewing Matthew's family, she then tries to interview Clive who was so protective of Dax he refused to even confirm his age. Not long after this, she interviews Gina Jones, who tells her about Tregarren College and Dax's invitation there. Caroline follows this tip and finds Dax in Polgammon, where she warns Dax that she doesn't trust Tregarren and thinks its sinister to whisk kids away and hide them behind a wall of granite, despite Dax's refusal to accept this. When Dax stubbornly refuses to answer her questions, she threatens to have the world's press show up at Tregarren College's front door if Principal Wood refuses to let her interview him. Although this panics Dax, to his surprise, she is invited emphatically by Wood to come to the grounds and look around. However, when she is there, Lisa felt a tightness around her chest whenever she saw Caroline, and no one realises why until it is too late. Wood tried to murder her in a toxic bog in the forest near Tregarren by thoroughly charming her and making her see a bridge that was not there. Pauline and Owen began to suspect something but were too late, so Dax, Lisa, Mia and Gideon are the only ones who can rescue her. Gideon and Dax use their abilities to free her and rescue her from death. In turn, she is grateful to Dax and does not try to threaten Tregarren again, but instead gives Dax a key to her bolthole, The Owl Box in Exmoor in case Tregarren truly cannot be trusted.
• Principal Patrick Wood - The principal of Tregarren College. Patrick is described as being in his forties, and not a very handsome man, with a thin, rather battered looking face and a very slight cross to his eyes. Despite this, however, he has a strange charisma to him. He is the first book's principle antagonist, although his role as such is only made certain toward the end of the book. Wood possesses the power of glamour; An umbrella term used for visual illusion type abilities such as vanishing, optical illusion and charm, which he uses to manipulate the respect of the students of Cola Club without their knowledge; Dax, however, realises that Shapeshifters like him are resistant to Glamour. It is revealed that Patrick is responsible for the death of the first Shapeshifter, a poor boy who had grown up in orphanages with the ability to shapeshift into a wolf, who was thus was not afraid to openly say that he could see through Patrick's glamour. For this, Patrick killed the first Shapeshifter in order to hold absolute control over Tregarren and its inhabitants. He almost succeeds in doing the same to Dax by manipulating Owen Hind into betraying Dax and trying to kill him. It almost works, as this betrayal lapses Dax back into his despair, yet it backfires. Dax manages to survive, whereas Patrick Wood falls 150 fathoms down into an abandoned mine shaft. His body was never retrieved.

Secondary and minor characters

• Gina Jones - An abusive, cruel stepmother to Dax, who routinely slaps him, shuts him outside for hours on end due to his "attitude" and treats him and his interests with disdain, even going so far as to give all of his books on wildlife, and his artist's materials away to a jumble sale collector. Dax had been four when she had met him, and she had never treated him with any sort of affection until Owen Hind appeared. Gina is not aware of Dax's shapeshifting ability, and believed that he had been taken to Tregarren College as a gifted student. Gina's attitude quickly changed toward Dax after this, calculating that she might be able to gain something if Dax were to be a genius, as well as being afraid that Dax might tell his father about the abuse she had wreaked on him.
• Alice Jones - Gina's daughter and Dax's half sister; Though her age is not canonically stated, it is speculated she is perhaps eight when Dax leaves for Tregarren College. Despite being indoctrinated into her mother's abuse and favoured by her, Alice is more ignorant and distanced than she is abusive to Dax. She offhandedly notices when Dax is hurt, is visibly sad when Dax has to leave for Tregarren, and even though the promise was not fulfilled, promises that she will take her dollies out of Dax's old room when he comes back during the school breaks.
• Robert W. Jones - Dax's absent father who works on an oil rig out at sea for months on end. Rarely, if ever, does Dax see his father, who is often preoccupied by Gina and Alice whenever he comes home from the rigs; He had promised to extend Dax's tiny bedroom, however because of his wife and daughter's demands, this promise was never kept. Robert Jones is a quiet, exhausted man who seems to always have bags under his grey eyes. In their attic, Dax had read old comic books belonging to Robert Jones about the Incredible Hulk, which he uses the memory of to try and understand his own shapeshifting abilities; This suggests that Robert was a fan of these books. During the book, Dax receives only a short Aberdeen postcard from his father, who had said he "Hope(d) to see you before the end of term.". This promise is also not kept.
• Matthew Spacey - A bully at Bark's End Junior school that brutally attacks Clive in the school boiler room and breaks a paper clock he'd made. Dax savagely attacks Matthew and his accomplice Toby for hurting his friend. Matthew's family play up the wounds for the press to try and get compensation for the attack. Matthew does not return to Bark's End after the attack.
• Toby Rodgers - Matthew's friend and bullying partner. Toby is a large, strong boy who bullies Clive mercilessly along with Matthew, and breaks the paper clock Clive made. After the attack, Toby is traumatised; He is quiet in class, sometimes sucks his thumb, and never bullies Clive again.
• Barry Blake - Barry is the friend and dorm-mate of Dax and Gideon, who is a glamourist with the power to turn invisible. Barry tends to disappear in class and when he's spacing out, but is not very good at it as he is clumsy and has issues with his adenoids which cause his nose to whistle. Although he is a kind boy, Barry has a mischievous streak where he will take dares to disappear in class, or when playing football.
• Spencer "Spook" Williams - Spook is a loud, dramatic Glamourist who likes to think of himself as a future world-star illusionist. He can make things visually appear from thin air, such as multicoloured parrots or small fireworks and can create optical illusions that make people see things which are not there, such as moved goalposts in football or the time he made Gideon think his dinner-plate was full of thousands of snails. He plays on the opposing home team, the Tregarren Tigers and often butts heads with Gideon. Dax, however, is resilient to his illusions, and only sees what looks to be like heat haze emanating from wherever the illusion is thrown, though Spook is not aware of this. Spook is antagonistic and cruel to Dax and Gideon, however has a soft spot for Mia, which has lingered.
• Jessica Moorland - Jessica is a powerful Psychic who often gives out the Spirit Communication Notice (SCN) Slips to Gideon about his Aunty Pam, who warns him of dangers from beyond the grave. Jessica tries to give SCN slips to Dax from Wolf, warning him of the danger that is to come, but is thwarted and charmed by Wood.
• Unnamed Shapeshifter "Wolf" - Wolf is the deceased spirit of the first shapeshifter, who died while in wolf form at the hands of Patrick Wood. He was a tough boy who had grown up in orphanages in Scotland, but had seen through Wood's deception and told Owen about it, that he could "smell" it. Wolf was murdered quickly as if a shapeshifter is killed in their animal form before they had time to transform back, they stay as that creature. Throughout the book, he tried to warn Dax about Wood from beyond the grave through SCN notices and through Lisa Hardman. Owen blames himself for the death of the boy.
• Mr Eades - Eades is a government-sanctioned witness to Dax's Development classes. He is described as wearing grey suit, with a tired face, wispy grey hair and horn-rimmed spectacles. Dax finds it difficult to shapeshift with his presence in his Development sessions, but Eades is adamant that no session is allowed to commence without at least two official witnesses. Generally, he is unfriendly and detached towards the COLAs.
• Mrs Dann - A no-nonsense human teacher at Tregarren College, with an anti-glamour arsenal at her disposal.

Themes and topics

The book explores such themes such as familial abuse, emotional repression, government suspicion, found family and absentee parenthood.

Publication history

As with all of the Shapeshifter books, Finding the Fox was published by Oxford University Press in 2006.

Recognition

Finding the Fox was nominated for the 2007 Bolton Children's Book Award, the Dutch Kinderboekenweek, and was awarded the number one book in 2002.

External links

• Finding the Fox at OUP
• Ali Sparkes at OUP
• Ali Sparkes's official page on the series