How's this for teen fiction?

Being a terrorist bomber is so in.

A new novel for teenagers about a mixed-race girl who trains to become a terrorist suicide bomber has become a bestseller in mainstream bookshops since its publication a month ago.

Checkmate, by the award-winning children's writer Malorie Blackman, features a heroine who is groomed by militant members of an oppressed ethnic group in an unspecified country - but there are many clues to it being Britain - to wear a vest bomb to kill a senior politician in a suicide mission on her 16th birthday.

Far from stoking controversy after the London bombings, the book looks set to become a sensation, with experts and children saying that Checkmate fulfils teenagers' need for contemporary, gritty fiction.

In four weeks, the book has risen to second place on Waterstone's teen fiction sales list. Last week, it was 19th on Amazon's list of bestselling books across all genres and staff of Books Etc reported yesterday that it was "flying off the shelves" and was being outsold only by Harry Potter and Philip Pullman's His Dark Materials trilogy in the teenage market.