‘Let neither friend nor foe this secret know.
In the wild world flies Stig 2450’ (p 267)
For the present
Here on the edge of the Yorkshire Wolds, not many miles from the Humber, October has felt like the month of the wild geese. Thousands have arrived to roost on the islands of the estuary and now head inland daily to feed on the stubble fields left behind by the recent grain harvest. My regular walk has been enlivened by the spectacle of wave after wave of pink-footed geese flying overhead in huge, ragged V formations, their incessant honking unmissable.
Reading Katya Balen’s book has seemed particularly apt at this time, not simply because of her protagonist’s name, but because I have felt a close kinship with eleven year-old October’s love of autumnal nature.
I am actually no great fan of fictional narrative written in the present tense, especially now that it has become so ubiquitous. There are notable exceptions, though. It seems to me this viewpoint is most truly effective when an author has a very particular narrative reason for the wanting the reader to share a protagonist’s intense, moment-to-moment experience. A few years back YA novelist Sally Green was shockingly arresting when she used such a present tense narration to capture the stream of consciousness of Half Bad ‘witch’, Nathan Byrn. The effect was disturbed, disturbing and quite devastating. More recently Christopher Edge has used first person, present tense narration to great effect in books like The Longest Night of Charlie Noon, where time and the perception of time play a pivotal part. And now here is another remarkable exception. Katya Balen’s chosen style captures brilliantly a sensual receptiveness in her young protagonist, October, that amounts almost to a perpetual state of mindfulness. She is intensely aware of every moment she lives, responding to the natural world around her with committed passion. October’s voice is utterly captivating and her story would not be the one it is were it written in any other way. Which is exactly how a fine novel should feel.
Wild woods and terrifying town
However, this intensity is conjured not solely by the narrative perspective but also by the author’s stunningly beautiful use of language. Her construction of prose is often breathtaking in its mastery, as is her occasional use of arresting typography. Whilst never obtrusively ‘arty’, her writing has an intrinsic lyricism that enchants the reading ear, thrills the senses, and stimulates the mind with its vivid conjuring of experience. Nor is it only October’s adoration of her life living wild in the woods with her father that is caught with persuasive truthfulness. This is contrasted quite wonderfully with her horrified reaction to everything around her when, after a serious incident, she is forced to live instead with her estranged mother in London. Her appalled terror at the unfamiliar oppression of the sights, sounds and smells of the city is also conveyed with devastating potency.
Inside and out
There is also much of huge implicit importance in Katya Balen’s book, caught as effectively through her clever writing as it is through her storytelling. In first establishing October in the context of the wild, wood-living life that she experiences as so idyllic, our empathy for her is deeply established. This means that when, in the city, she exhibits behaviours that could well be experienced as strange or ‘difficult’, we already see and understand things completely from her perspective. We fully appreciate her ‘normal’, even when it may be very different from that of others. It is therefore a book that engenders understanding in a truly vital and compelling way. More than this, without any feeling of didacticism, it also shows how beneficial to children experiencing dislocation and loss can be the patience, acceptances and appropriate love of others, whether they be a parent, friend or teacher.
Naturally the best
As happens, I am also a huge fan of Angela Harding’s art work. For several years now her Advent calendars have taken our family’s countdown to Christmas to a whole new level of loveliness, and many special celebrations have been marked by the sending of one of her magical greetings cards. She captures a vibrant and deeply effecting essence of the natural world quite breathtakingly, and her jacket for October, October is a perfect example of this. It is almost impossible to think of there being a more fitting cover for any book. Equally apt and moving are her vignettes of Stig, the owl that October rescues. Interspersed through the text, they echo Katy’s Balen’s story in leading the reader towards the final heart-lifting image of freedom and flight.
Wild anywhere
This book captures so vividly and powerfully the potency of the wild, with its healing and invigorating potential, that even young readers who have no direct experience of wildness will be able to find it vicariously through October. In her they can discover the value of wildness in their own lives and world, whatever the context of their current living. There is a somewhat different, if related, theme in the book too, that also has much to offer young readers. This is the idea encapsulated in the activity of Thames Mudlarking, rediscovering lost treasures from the past, and not only rediscovering them but ‘hearing’ and telling their stories. All this, of course, is in addition to the most valuable insight into the lives and minds of others who may appear to think differently from us but have so much to offer in and through that difference. And, above everything, October, October is a thoroughly enchanting and engaging read that ravishes with its writing. There is so much treasure for young readers (or indeed older ones too) to discover in this wonderful book.
‘All the world is wild and waiting for me.’ says October. (p 287). It is waiting now for us all. In the present. Which is exactly where it should be. Where it is.
In my last post I flagged Finbar Hawkins’ Witch as my YA book of the year so far. Now October, October leaps into my other top spot, as front runner for children’s novel of the year. In fact, it is way ahead of the field.
The same but different
Back when I was a teacher I loved to explore comparisons and contrasts with my class. If I were reading October, October with them (which I certainly would have been, were it around then) I would compare it with American author Lauren Wolk’s equally superb Echo Mountain, which also explores wildness, of both nature and character, but within the context of a very different landscape and culture. I would also contrast Katya Balen’s story with one of the several excellent children’s novels about evacuees in World War II, where the experience of children was so often exactly the opposite of October’s, being uprooted from urban life and moved into the alien countryside.
Major awards
October, October has now won the 2022 Yoto Carnegie Medal and the 2022 UKLA Book Award in the 7-10+ category. Congratulations to a wonderful writer.