The Copper Gauntlet (Magisterium #2) by Holly Black & Cassandra Clare

 

With their first book in this new sequence, The Iron Trial, these talented, experienced and hugely popular writers worked a very clever trick. They started a story which seemed to be based on so many of the now standard features of Harry Potter type children's fantasy that it was feeling almost clichéd. Before the end however they had given this such an original twist, and confounded so dramatically all the expectations they had cannily set up, that it emerged as a most interesting and exciting new contribution to the genre. (See my post from Feb '15.)

Coming to a second in the series however, I did wonder whether they would be able to sustain the same level of originality, having shot the bolt of their devastating surprise at the end of the first novel. I need not have feared. The authors have managed to capitalise wonderfully on the tensions they set up, and even managed to spring a few more surprises, in what is another page turning thriller that builds towards a shocking climax. This is helped along by the very skilful writing and adept plotting you would expect from these two authors. The ending of this second book is, in some ways, rather more positive than the first, although there remain enough intriguing ambiguities and unresolved issues to promise more enjoyable follow-ons.

 

This is essentially comfort reading rather than great children's literature. It is at heart a story about a group of friends having an adventure, albeit with a sinister overlay; The Famous Five, reimagined for contemporary kids through the addition of dark magic. It has all the classic elements, strong friendships and equally strong enmities, jealousies and misunderstandings, sympathetic and hostile adults - and a very special animal. Its characters and relationships are of course far more interesting and complex that anything Blyton ever wrote, and unlike such precursors it includes a dark overlord, no few diabolical monsters, and the persistent threat of evil. In Magisterium all of this is most interestingly intensified by a core confusion about where the boundaries between light and dark lie, particularly within the persona of its principle protagonist.

 

I am sure there will be many children who will feel that here at last, after so many other books have been misleadingly hyped, is something which really is as good as Harry Potter. They will will not be far wrong. It has enough of the same features to make its world reassuringly familiar, and more than enough that is original and different to keep it always intensely engaging and exciting. It explores many of the situations and feelings children know and understand at the same time as giving them, through imagination and empathy, the magical powers they would so like to have. It will entertain, thrill, amuse and 'safely' scare them. J.K.Rowling succeeded because she provided all these things in spades; it looks like these two skilful writers are doing the same.

 

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The Marvels by Brian Selznick

I make no apology for including here a book that isn't a fantasy, because The Marvels is a truly magical work in just about every other possible way.

Brian Selsnick's contribution to children's literature has already been amazing, ground breaking in the most exciting of ways. Very much out on his own, he has created what is essentially a new genre of fiction, a novel told through pictures as well as words.

The picture book has, of course, been one of the most important and artistically productive genres in children's literature for a long time. The art of storytelling through graphic conventions has also been an occasional but significant element, developed in pioneering series like Tintin and Asterix. However Brian Selznick's works are categorically not picture books as we know them, nor are they comic books or graphic novels. In most picture books the illustrations complement the words, in one way or another, sometimes simple, sometimes complex. Here pictures alone carry much of the storytelling. In this way these works are much more closely akin to the wonderful wordless picture books of David Wiesner, Shaun Tan or Raymond Briggs. However Brian Selznick's are in every sense full-length novels, with all the extended development, depth and complexity that this term implies. Their uniqueness lies in that their narrative is conveyed through whole sections of full double spread pictures as well as, at other times, through words. The interrelationship of these two forms, of the stories they tell and the way they are told, is germane to Brian Selznick's creations. They are very special.

Although I think The Marvels is the pinnacle of his work to date, it does,of course, have two glorious precedents. His first book in this particular style was the deservedly lauded and awarded The Invention of Hugo Cabret, a considerable wonder of an achievement in itself - and a very important milestone in the history of children's literature.Although Martin Scorsese's subsequent film of the book, titled just Hugo, was an affectionate homage and itself very lovely to look at, in no way could it ever have come near to the quality of experience of the original. It is as a reading phenomenon that this work is so special.

Also a delightful and important book is his second foray into this genre, Wonder Struck. It is particularly exciting that Brian Selsnick continued - and indeed continues - to explore his own format through each subsequent title. The first book told its story primarily through pictures, but with interleaved short passages of text continuing the same narrative. Wonder Struck tells two stories separated by fifty years, one entirely in pictures, the other entirely in words, with each in short sections, again physically interspersed. As the book progresses the intriguing relationship between these two stories gradually becomes apparent.

The Marvels is slightly different in structure again; a further inventive exploration. The first 400 or so pages of the book tell the story of the eponymous Marvels, a family of theatre folk, over several generations, entirely in pictures. They tell it quite wonderfully too. Brian Selznick's trademark full page pencil drawing are enchantingly lovely. He uses a wide range of cinematic perspectives - long shots, overheads, close ups, ultra close ups - and the illusion of different momentums, ranging from quick fire action and periods of quiet stillness, to propell the narrative and dramatically engage the reader. It is amazing how much intense empathy for his characters these pictures can evoke. His story is intriguing and sometimes cleverly shocks by letting readers discover that what they had been led to believe thus far was complete wrong. His interiors and exteriors, including weather and lighting, are often exquisite achieved within the medium. His figure drawing is somewhat naive, yet still enchanting. However it is in his drawing of human faces, in close up and ultra close up, that his great genius as an artist lies. Not only are his faces often exquisitely beautiful, but they convey thoughts and emotions with almost unbelievable depth and truth. The crowning glory of this is his drawing of these characters' eyes. In his hands, these eyes truly are windows to the soul; they convey a complexity of inner life and feeling that is quite uncanny. I would need to reference some of the great masters of portraiture to find anything comparable. They are startling, stunning and so very moving. Anyone thinking that reading pictures like this is a soft option compared to reading text would be very wrong. It needs sensitivity and acuity of observation, and as much, if not more, imaginative contribution from the reader as any written text. However is is a most worthwhile and rewarding activity.

In the second main section of the book, the author tells a story, set much later, in 1990. This principally concerns a runaway boy, Joseph who finds himself staying with his Uncle Albert in a remarkable time-capsule of a house in Spittalfields, London. This narration is entirely in prose and it is clear that, on top of his remarkable drawing skill, Brian Selznick is no slouch with words either. The writing is sensitive and masterly. The story is engaging and intriguing. However it is the gradually discovered relationship between the written narrative and the picture story that is at its heart. The way that we as readers are allowed to tease out what fits where, spiced with the occasional tingling shock of realising that we have been misled, is a real delight and ultimately a most moving revelation. There are ambiguities too, and these just make this remarkable text all the more rich and rewarding.

Towards the very end the narrative reverts to pictures only and so squares the circle, in several ways. Not only is this a return to the format of the earlier storytelling, but it now raises some of the same questions. Of course they are now seen in a different light. The earlier drawings turned out to have been created by a character in the later story. Who is supposed to have drawn these later ones? Do they represent something that actually happened, or are they just someone's dream? Is this part of the 'real' story? But then of course, even the 'real' story is itself a fiction. The whole also, however, has some relationship to an actual reality, that of a remarkable man called Dennis Severs who did indeed create a time-capsule house which can still be visited at 18 Folgate Street, Spittalfields in London. This book both answers questions and asks others. The ideas contained in its multiple layers and considerable depths are fascinating, enigmatic but ultimately beautiful. It challenges our ideas of what is real and what is true and proves yet again that story does not have to be one in order to be the other. This book matters, as only the very greatest of books matter.

There is another way too in which The Marvels is hugely important. It presents a gay relationship in exactly the way I think a 21st Century children's book should do, and needs to do; not only as a loving, long term commitment, but as one which is not 'an issue' in any way. It is simply accepted by Joseph and those around him as a normal, and very special, part of life. When, later, Joseph's own future, in another gay partnership, is subtly and sensitively sketched in, it is touching and beautiful - and perfectly normal too. Children in our still often all too prejudiced world need to see this normality so affectingly modelled.

In fact this work is wonderfully important in so many ways. It pushes the boundaries of Brian Selznick's own ground breaking genre and opens new levels of richness. It movingly tributes Dennis Severs' amazing creation of 18 Folgate Street, yet remains, every word and picture, a magnificent and totally original artistic creation in its own right. For years to come it will enrich the lives of those children who access and explore it, who open themselves to its many marvels and start to see all there is to see in it. It will deepen not only their intellectual understanding but their emotional understanding of their world: of history, lineage and heritage, of stories and dreams, of the reality of the imagination, of beauty, of integrity, of poetry and drama and music, of home and family, and of love.

Some won't see it, but that will be their loss.

The Marvels is the gift of one gentle, quirky, original, inspired anduniquely talented man to the memory of another such - and through him to us all. It will become one of the great works of children's literature of all time, not just of our own. No. It already is.

Note:

If after reading The Marvels you are fascinated by the idea of the Spittalfields house - and it is hard to see who wouldn't be - then I would warmly encourage adults (and maybe some children) to read Dennis Severs' own book 18 Folgate Street (available from the website). It is as charming, whimsical, eclectic and enigmatic as the house itself. Visit too someday, of course; but I suspect that, like me, you will already want that.

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The Shepherd’s Crown by Terry Pratchett

 

The last published Discworld novel by Terry Pratchett was always going to be a special book, in his readers' affection if nothing else. His contribution to fantasy literature has been enormous, ground-breaking, seminal, what you will. The pure pleasure he has given to so many has been immeasurable. He has also made a most significant (and enjoyable) contribution to children's/YA fantasy writing through the Tiffany Aching series (see my post from June '14). It is therefore a double delight that his last novel is also a continuation of Tiffany Aching's story. That it turns out to be a rather wonderful book in its own right is a considerable bonus. We would confidently have expected this from such a master wordsmith if it hadn't been for his encroaching illness. But we need say no more about that here. No apologia is needed. This book can more than stand up for itself - and will continue to do so for a considerable time to come.

The wonderful Tiffany Aching sequence, is built both structurally and thematically, around the growth from girlhood to early womanhood of its eponymous character. It recounts the key stages of Tiffany's development both as a witch and as a person, which ultimately amount to the same thing. The most charming, and in some ways the most entertaining, of the books are those which deal with the young Tiffany - not least because that is when we are first introduced to a certain little tribe that is one of Terry Pratchett's most entertaining creations, the clan Nac Mac Feegle. The fourth of the sequence, I Shall Wear Midnight, probably remains the most important and the most magical, because that is where Tiffany fully comes into her power as a witch and accepts the implications of who she truly is, even though this means sacrificing a more normal future with her 'young man', Preston. It will always be for me a very moving and special book.

Although not, to be honest, in quite the same exalted league, The Shepherd's Crown does provide a significant extension of Tiffany's personal journey. Now a young woman, it catalogues her personal struggles in taking on the mantle of the Discworld's leading witch, following the death of Granny Weatherwax.

Delightfully The Shepherd's Crown is suffused with the trademark humour of its author, humour which ranges from the sublimely witty to the joyfully silly. It also has quotable aphorisms aplenty. Terry Pratchett's erudite eclecticism still involves misquoting sources as dispirate as Dad's Army and Shakespeare. His effervescent and twinkly wicked invention still includes the coining of names like Becky Pardon, the creation of characters like the privy-using goat, and the mild scatalogy of witches' broom makers cutting a special notch in the staff to accommodate the 'comfort' of a male rider.

However it has to be said that, although the through line of Tiffany's development is clear, this book, does not have the strongest storyline of the Terry Pratchett oeuvre, or indeed of the Tiffany Aching sequence. Its narrative is particularly meandering and episodic. It is sometimes lyrical, more often anecdotal but, the final battles with the elves apart, it is rarely action-packed. As such it's is almost certainly not the best introduction to either Discworld or to Tiffany Aching. But then it is very much a conclusion, an ending, so it wouldn't be, would it?

Nevertheless, this book does contain a number of very wonderful and very important story elements.

As might perhaps be expected in a book from this author at this stage of his own life, it is very much about death and legacy. The whole long sequence about the death of Granny Weatherwax, which dominates much of the early part of the book, is quite superbly handled. He narrates beautifully Granny's simple acceptance of her own impending death, expressed through her very practical preparations for it. Yet, when it happens, he also skilfully expresses its resonance through so many dispirate lives across Discworld. Her conversation with Death is another Terry Pratchett classic, touching in its honesty. This is not a picturing of death that plumbs the depths of religious (or anti-religious) theorising, but it is nevertheless a profound and moving depiction of acceptance and reconciliation, of the proper and natural end of a long life well spent. It also, of course, sets up the context for what will be the principal developmental theme of the rest of the novel: whether Tiffany should take over 'wearing Granny's boots', whether she wants to, whether she can if she wants to, and if so how she should go about it if she does.

A second quite stunning and vitally important element of this final Tiffany Aching book is Terry Pratchett's bringing into being the brand new character, Geoffrey Swivel. Geoffrey is a reader, an animal lover and a vegetarian. He is a 'calm-bringer' not a fighter and he empathises readily with other human beings. In other words his interests and inclinations are those which some factions of our society still identify as 'girly'. To compound this, he wants to be a witch, a role hitherto exclusively filled by females. Yet he is portrayed as an enormously strong and influential character within the story. Indeed he not only contributes very significantly to the defeat of the elves but is the person eventually chosen by Tiffany for a particularly special role. One of the most telling passages of the book comes when Tiffany questions whether Geoffery really wants to become a witch rather than a wizard, reminding him that it is not considered a very manly calling: 'I've never thought of myself as a man, Mistress Tiffany. I don't think I'm anything. I'm just me,' He said quietly. In his portrayal of Geoffery Swivel Terry Pratchett makes the strongest possible case against gender stereotyping, and provides a supportive and sympathetic role model for boys of similar disposition, of which there are many. Good for him.

Of course at the centre of this book is Tiffany herself. Despite her magical abilities and her calling as a witch, Tiffany Aching is easily one of the most human, the most real of Terry Pratchett's creations. It would be unfair and inaccurate to say that Discworld is inhabited completely by two-dimensional characters, quite a few have significant depth, but Tiffany is more fully rounded, more complex and ambivalent in her makeup than most. This has been well established in the earlier books in her series, but it is certainly compounded here. Tiffany's full commitment to becoming a witch, made at the end of I Shall Wear Midnight turns out, realistically, not to be the end of the story. It is significant that her interpretation of this role in practice involves relatively little magic and much more caring for people - she is essentially a district nurse/midwife on a broomstick. Further, her big issue in deciding in whose shoes, or 'boots', she wants to live her adult life, is very real, one with which it is very easy to identify. When, at the end of the book, she realises that she can only be herself, not try to live like someone else, however significant that person's life might have been, Terry Pratchett is making his most important statement in this book, and perhaps in his entire oeuvre.

There is one more vital element in Tiffany's story, 'The Chalk', the place where she was born and brought up, as were all her family before her. Just as Tiffany has always been the most real of Terry Pratchett's characters, so The Chalk is the most real place in Discworld. Its landscape, its features and its very particular rural activities are really very close to those of a part of England. It is a little bit of England in the middle of Discworld. And it is Tiffany's bond to this place, the place where her family has always belonged, where she herself feels rooted, grounded, which ultimately motivates her. The Chalk helps Tiffany find herself. She needs to know not only who, but where she is, where she comes from. Tiffany finally sees her true heritage as being from her own grandmother, Granny Aching, the shepherd, and from The Chalk itself. It is the titular Shepherds Crown on a thong around her neck, and the spirits of her grandmother's sheep dogs which seem to be the source of her ultimate victory over the elves, and in the end she realises this..

Importantly, the Shepherd's Crown is not actually a magical,object, it is a relic and a symbol of The Chalk and its ancient past. Although she will continue as a witch, in her own way, Tiffany will in future be just as much a shepherd, as was her own grandmother. She is discovering a new 'magic '. At the very end of the book she moves into the little shepherd's hut which she herself has built, not using witch magic, but with her own hands, and: 'From the bed she could see out of a small window - see clear across the downs, right to the horizon. And she could see the sun rise, and set, and the moon dance through its guises - the magic of everyday that was no less magic for that.'

Discworld is changing too, perhaps also becoming less magical, or magical in a different way. Not only will Tiffany be a very different kind of 'Senior Witch', but the railways have arrived and are crisscrossing the landscape with the iron that will ultimately reduce the evil elves to storybook fairies. The goblins are being integrated into society. Industrialisation will change Discworld as it did our own. Fantasy will eventually meld back into reality. Not yet, but it is coming. It may not be the change that we want, but it will happen nonetheless. We and the inhabitants of Discworld will just have to accept it,

This is at heart a gentle book, but also a brave one and a wise one. The ideas which it embodies are essentially simple: that when a life draws to its proper end, death is to be accepted and not feared; that we need to move past gender stereotypes; that each of us has both a right and a duty to be our own person; that certain people are fortunate to belong to a particular place and take forward its legacy; that as time moves on the world must change; that peacemaking ('calm-bringing') is a wonderful thing, but that sometimes we just have to fight back when those we love are threatened.

Such thoughts are not particularly original. They have been said and heard often enough before. However they are profoundly truthful. They need to be said and heard again - and again. To fully understand this, to say the things that need to be said without trying to be fancy or smart arsed, and to say them with both wit and compassion, is the wisdom of age. Terry Pratchett 's writing is deeply humane. If we allow it to, then reading it will make us all a little more human. This is why his work and its crown, its Shepherd's Crown, are very special. Terry Pratchett's final book will be read by folk of many ages, but he chose to write it for the young. To quote the man himself: 'They are to deal with the future. And being young means they've got a lot of future.' He has left to them the accumulated wisdom, the simple truths of one whose actual life had very little future. It is a wonderful gift. And now he has a lot of future too.

 

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A Curious Tale of the In-Between by Lauren DeStefano

I have noted before that some books seem to find their own way to you; they chose their own time to be read. Here is a good example. I am currently in the middle of reading Terry Pratchett's final Tiffany Aching , a book I that have been eagerly awaiting. It is a fine book and I am enjoying it enormously. I confidently expect that it will be the subject of my next post. Yet when A Curious Tale of the In-Between landed on my doormat, in consequence of a pre-order I had almost forgotten, I just flipped it open to get a feel of the writing and virtually didn't stop reading until I had finished it.

It is clearly a compelling little tale. This is in no small part due to wonderful writing, both in terms of its language and of its narrative. It is strikingly original in concept and in realisation. Both its language and its story have a certain quirkiness, an arresting weirdness, and emanate from a very unique and special authorial voice. Lauren DeStefano adds to this a protagonist - twelve year old Pram, who is beautifully drawn and readily engenders empathy - and a supporting cast of equally vivid characters. In consequence, a reading experience which starts off as intriguing rapidly becomes engrossing. Beneath its quirky, sometimes humorous, cloak this book shelters much truth, warmth and humanity.

A children's book (key audience around 9-13?) is I think a new departure for popular US YA author Lauren DeStefano. The genre of this relatively short novel is rather hard to pin down. It hovers between ghost story and fantasy. However it is probably in the end closer to fantasy, or perhaps 'magical realism'. Within its own parameters as a fiction, ghosts, and Pram's ability to see and talk to them, are perfectly real. Others may think she is imagining them, but she is not. This ability is her 'magic', her gift. Yet underneath this her situation and her issues are very grounded. In this, the novel shares much with a strong tradition of American children's literature that uses fantasy to explore the issues of very real kids, often when they find themselves in challenging life circumstances. It is related to other wonderful, and equally 'spooky' books like Holly Black's Doll Bones and Anne Ursu's Breadcrumbs, although as with both these examples, it is never derivative, always totally its own work.

On many levels 'spooky' is too comfortable a term for this book. There are many things about A Curious Tale of the In-Between which are genuinely frightening and possibly disturbing. The story opens with a brief but vivid scene of a pregnant mother hung from a tree; this sets something of a tone for later developments. It is a book for children, but for children with a certain maturity as readers. Actually these opening paragraphs are quickly passed and the story settles for quite a while into a charming and entertaining one where the ghosts encountered are no more threatening to either Pram or the reader than those of, say, Neil Gayman's Graveyard Book; they are friendly little chappies. In fact the principal ghost at this stage is Felix, a young boy who fulfills much the same role for isolated Pram as would the imaginary friend, even though he is actually as real as it is possible for a ghost to be. At the same time Pram's growing friendship with, Clarence, a living boy from her school, is warm and reassuring.

However, about half way through, the story takes a decidedly darker turn and enters a long sequence which verges on the surreal. It is at least disquieting and potentially genuinely frightening. Even though the final denouement returns to something much more positive, if still somewhat ambiguous, this is overall quite a long way from being a cozy read. To put this in perspective, the darkest parts are no more dark than those, say, in the final book of Harry Potter. However there is something in the way this book treats with death, and sets ghosts and the spirit world against a otherwise comparatively realistsic setting, that could be very troubling for some. I do hope that not too many children (or parents) are put off by this, for within, and indeed through, this somewhat dark context, this book has a great deal of humanity and compassion. More than anything it has much of major importance to say about being a child of this age.

Many books for young readers concern themselves with growing up, with coming of age, with an individual starting to become 'what they were meant to be.' This is of course a crucial theme. However A Curious Tale of the In-Between is not really about growing up. It is about being almost-but-not-quite-ready-to-grow-up, not-really-a-child-but-not-yet-an-adolescent-either, and this stage is in itself a most important and valuable part of life. It is not simply a preparation for adulthood or even for adolescence, it is something in its own right. Further, at its very heart this book is a pean to that quality of love that abides in very special, close friendship. This can often and particularly be found at this age, for it is a love which is not yet ready to be sexual, it is not even really romantic. Nevertheless it is love, a very intense and poignant love. It is significant that the nightmares of the book are precipitated by the sudden absence of the ghost Felix, but even more so by what happens to Clarence.

The friendship Pram has for Felix is indeed a childish one, a friendship of shared laughter and silly games, and by the end of the novel she is ready to move past it. But the friendship she develops for Clarence is truly one of love, perhaps the purest she will ever know. It belongs to pre-adolescence and to that period alone. It may be that in the furture it will grow into something different for either or both of them. But for the present it is what it is. It Is important. Their present stage of life is important, for them and for all children, and it is important for children to know this. It is a worry when our society pressurises them to hurry through or past it.

At the very end of the book Pram can start to see some of the things she might do and some of the things she might become in the the future. However she also knows that she is not quite ready yet to be older than she is. Good for her. This is a very special and rather wonderful book. It is a tale of the in-between in more ways than one. It is a tale about and for the in-between.

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The Golden Specific (Mapmakers Book 2) by S.E.Grove

 

Currently the children's shelves at bookshops are crowded with easy reads, straightforward linear fictions with near stock characters and predictable plots. They entertain their readers with the warming escapism of silly humour or vicarious adventure. Such books are not to be belittled. The young often need the comfort of the familiar, the readily accessible, and anything that gets and keeps them reading is of considerable value. However it is also important that young readers are sometimes challenged with more complex stories, ones that introduce them to the wonderful possibilities of non-linear and multi stranded recounts. Many specialists believe that interaction with such narratives - whether in the medium of print, film, TV or indeed video games - actively contributes to the development of complex cognitive reasoning. I can well believe it. I certainly think such processing adds significantly to our understanding of interrelationships, of life and people, of thought and time, and perhaps especially to our knowledge of ourselves.

So when a work of children's fiction comes along that is brave enough to eschew condescension and challenge its young readers with multi layered complexity it is to be most warmly welcomed. When such a book not only provides challenge and its consequent reward but is hugely enjoyable too, then it is a true treasure.

This certainly applies to US author S. E. Grove's ongoing Mapmakers sequence, of which Volume Two is now available here, albeit only easily sourced through online retail. I was enthusiastic about its highly promising first book, The Glass Sentence (see my post from Jan '15), and this second is, if anything, even better; long and complex for young readers, but very exciting not least because of the wildly original, wonderfully imaginative stimulation it offers.

Other reviews have compared Mapmakers to Philip Pulman's His Dark Materials trilogy (The Golden Compass in US). The two actually have relatively little in common in terms of plot, characters or themes. What they do share however is the fact that they create stunningly rich fantasy worlds, each the product of a unique and very special authorial imagination. Each work is grounded in a place that appears initially to be much like one in our own world (Lyra's Oxford and Sophia's Boston) but which soon turns out to be not at all as we know it. Each too then extends into a vast fantasy creation much of which is again both fascinatingly like, and at the same time totally unlike, our own world and its history. What I think it is fair to say is that S E. Groves's creation is shaping up to be the most originally imaginative children's epic fantasy since Philip Pulman's.

The Golden Specific continues to explore the world of The Glass Sentence, one based on a globe that appears to share our own geography but has been devastated by a fracturing of history that has left it divided into wildly dispirate time periods or 'Ages'. In fact the consequences of this are more fully and directly explored here than in the first book. Over and above their weird simultaneous existence, these various historical ages are significantly different from those of our own world. They do contain certain familiar echoes - such as the expansion westwards into 'Indian Territory' by the early US settlers, the Spanish Inquisition, the wearing of 'plague doctor' masks in 17/18th Century Europe - but they also feature events, people and objects that we would call supernatural or magical. Here are also worlds of different politics, different cultures, different belief system, all with characteristics both familiar and strange. However all are quite wonderfully conjured and given their own reality by this author's incredible imagination and masterful pen.

Like the classic middle section of The Lord of the Rings, this installmemt of Mapmakers is told as a split narrative; it consequently has the same totally compelling engagement and drive. Sophia remains the principal character and pursues her quest for her missing parents by travelling across the Atlantic to another era where she has to engage with a hostile 'Dark Age' and seek out a magically restorative village. Alternating is the story of Theo, the book's other principal protagonist, who remains in Boston battling an old adversary and trying to prove that Spohia's uncle is innocent of murder. Interspersed again there is also a flashback first person narration by Sophia's mother of the events leading up to her and her husband's disappearance. There are stories within stories too, accessed through the uber-reality of this world's very special maps, or narrated by other characters. It is a heady brew. Sophie's adventures are not only by turns high-adrenaline and grippingly intriguing, they are also often mystical, philosophical, magical, even poetic. In contrast Theo's escapades can be gruesome and frightening, but also at times light-hearted, amusing, cartoonish, even farcical. They counterpoint the story quite wonderfully and provide just the needed respite to the more lyrical and intense threads.

A fiction of such eclectic fusions could in other hands have so easily become a disparate mash of confused and disjointed elements. However it is a testament to S. E. Grove's masterly writing that she holds all of these strands together. She ultimately constructs an intrinsic, if complex, logic even though this only manifest slowly as the novel develops. However she also leaves enough space within her narrative for readers to weft their own imaginative and cognitive bindings between the tale's multiple threads. It is actually this last skill which is probably the strongest indicator of her genius - and I do not use the word lightly. It is in these self-realised potentialities that the reader's greatest involvement lies. That involvement is, in consequence, as deep and multi layered as the narrative.

At the start of Chapter 34 the author writes this stunning passage. It is one of those rare 'Yes!' moments in reading that stopped me in my tracks and filled me with astounded admiration.

"Sophie had no notion of time passing. She was not entirely sure of where she was either. So completely had she submerged herself in the memories of the beaded map, she felt as though she had lived a year in Alvar Cabeza de Cabra's skin. She had seen the parched, harsh world as he saw it, grieved its losses as he grieved them, felt the feeble thread of hope given to him as he felt it. Somewhere, like a distant echo, she felt these things as Sophie, too."

In describing so poignantly Sophie's engagement with a magical map, S. E. Grove could not have better expressed the reader's experience of a rich, engrossing and evocative narrative like The Golden Specific. Such is this writer's astounding power of imagination and her command of language, thought, feeling and narrative that she magically creates for her audience just such a multi sensory, multidimensional map as she has invented for her characters.

Whilst, by the end of The Goldn Specific most immediate goals have been reached, much inevitably remains unresolved, and Theo's plight is nothing if not desperate. On finally closing the book readers will I'm sure be in an ambivalent position, thrilled that there is more to come, but devastated at the prospect of having to wait for it.

The very best stories are true even though they are not real. This applies strongly to this one. S. E. Grove has found human truth in wild fantasy and that is a very special talent indeed. The so aptly named Mapmakers is already a truly wonderful work, and a profoundly important one. By the time its third part is added I think there is every chance that it will prove to be one of the great works of children's literature of any age or clime.

 

 

 

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Clariel (prequel to The Old Kingdom trilogy) by Garth Nix

Having discussed the importance of Australian children's writers in my last post, I realise that I have not yet actually written up here any of the recent books by the key fantasy author Garth Nix. This omission needs to be rectified as he is not only a wonderful writer in his own right but also a key influence on the fantasy genre itself. So much so that, if his YA novels seem somewhat familiar in approach and style, it must be remembered that it is he who set a trend since followed by others and not the other way around. Garth Nix is very much an originator and not an imitator.

Of course the start of what is almost certainly his most important work, the Old Kingdom trilogy (sometimes called the Abhorsen trilogy), is now some twenty years old, with Sabriel, its initial volume published in 1995. The two sequels, Lirael and Abhorsen followed in the early Noughties and this original sequence lies on the cusp of the C21 achievements I have set out to discover. In fact it is broadly contemporary in genesis with much of Harry Potter and can, in many ways, be considered the YA equivalent of that children's blockbuster in terms of its seminal significance.

 

However Garth Nix has far more recently produced a further substantial addition to the Old Kingdom sequence, Clariel, 2014, and this certainly qualifies as a gem amongst my recent reading. It is not only a hugely worthwhile extension of his earlier creation, but also a truly great work of fantasy fiction in its own right.

 

Clariel is actually a prequel to the earlier trilogy. It is set fully within the Old Kingdom, but about six hundred years before the birth of Sabriel. However there is much about her world as reimagined here that is immediately recognisable. For previous readers of the Abhorsen sequence it comes as a thrill to learn some of the history that shaped the society they already know. However it's nature as a prequel means that Clariel can also serve as a perfectly valid introduction to the Old Kingdom books, albeit without providing that same sense of illumination that it will for those already familiar with subsequent events. New readers have so much yet to discover. Whilst it is almost impossible to imagine that they will not want to go back, or perhaps rather go on, to the earlier books, Clariel does in fact also constitute a totally viable stand alone fantasy. Whichever way it is approached it is a very rich and rewarding read indeed.

 

In many ways Clariel epitomises what Garth Nix has achieved so fully in creating and defining high fantasy for a YA readership, even whilst it is also a shocking departure from the expected.

 

The first thing that this author does, and does supremely well, is to create an imagined world of extraordinary richness and detail. It is essentially a classic high fantasy world, a complex society with a broadly mediaeval feel: a highly stratified society of kings and lords, of hierarchical and powerful guilds, of downtrodden impoverished masses, but also of magic and powerful mages, of demons and monsters and of a wilder, older magic too. But these are no glib stereotypes. Everything is imagined and conveyed with rich and compelling complexity, glued together with its own convincing logic and described in vivid and telling detail. Just as tellingly conveyed is the vast topography of a whole world. In Clariel this is at its height in the creation and description of the principal city of the Old Kingdom, where streets, markets, hovels, towers and palaces all exist with staggering, often mesmerising presence. Similarly conjured for the reader are the varied landscapes of the countyside and the more rural Abhorsen House where Clariel finds herself later in the story. Garth Nix peoples this world with a staggeringly large array of beautifully drawn characters. And all of this is managed with a masterly skill which makes even his descriptive writing compelling, and fully integrated into some of the best and most enthralling storytelling I have encountered in a long time. The result of all this is a world and a book which is totally and completely involving; one which provides what I always think of as 'the Tolkein factor', a substantial immersive experience where the reader can vicariously live in a completely fantastical world which is magically imbued with a totally compelling reality.

 

However the key thing which Garth Nix began to do twenty years ago, so pioneering this particular genre of YA fantasy, was to place totally convincing teenage protagonists within this wonderfully rich and complex world; to tell stories which resonated emotionally with his young readership whilst still sitting with total credibility within their fantasy setting. In fact this setting created a very special context, where issues and feelings pertinent to his readers could be worked out at a 'safe' remove; allowing the process of growing towards adulthood to be explored vicariously; permitting hopes and fantasies to be pursued, perhaps even fulfilled, in a viscerally exciting way,whilst still protected from their actual consequences. This is something which he again achieves superbly in Clariel, but with the addition of further dimensions and subtleties.

Clariel is again primarily for a YA audience, although it undoubtedly also comes into the category which will enthrall and delight many adult readers too. It contains scattered sexually references, although these are very mild and never explicit. However what makes it ideally suited for YA readers is the fact that Clariel and her story are most skillful conceived to engender close identification from this particular audience. She lives fully in the world of the Old Kingdom, yet her issues are those of so many adolescents. Although aware that she is growing up, and in many ways wanting to do so, Clariel is not fully ready to enter into the 'adult' and demanding social and political world. She is on the verge of rebelling against her parents' wishes to fit her into this society and dreams instead of a future life away from other people, in the forest where she has spent an idyllic childhood. She also has a propensity towards violent outburst of anger, which she realises she must learn to master, but has not yet learned to control. Even though placed here in the context of raw magical power, this is a dilemma with which many young readers will be able to identify. Clariel is quite beautifully brought to virtual life by Garth Nix and soon engenders the reader's fully involvement with her story. We think and feel with her every moment; we share the confusion of her dilemmas and the naive optimism of her every decision.

 

Here it becomes very difficult to explain the real greatness of Clariel as a novel without indulging in what would be spoilers, and I would never wish at all to mar some other reader's pleasure in this way. For it is in the amazing, development of Clariel's character and story, essentially and intimately intertwined, that the genius and originally of this book lies. The directions which she takes and the outcomes of her actions are all the more devastatingly powerful because of the total reader identification which has inescapably been set up. Suffice it to say that Clariel is no Frodo figure, saving her whole world through innocent bravery. She does, in her own way, grow up and she certainly influences her world, by the end of her story - and beyond. However, the ways in which she does this are as disturbing as they are remarkable. She is a magical protagonist - but not really as we might have expected.

 

The result is that Clariel is one of the truly great works of fantasy fiction. It is a most notable addition to a modern classic sequence, but also a wonderful literary achievement in its own right.

 

 

 

One further short addition to the Old Kingdom sequence has been published very recently, although its actual writing predates Clariel. To Hold the Bridge is a novella first published in Australia in 2010, but now finally released here in a volume of Garth Nix short stories of the same name. It is the only item in the collection which relates to the Abhorsen world, and as a novella is not of the stature of the earlier works, or of Clariel which followed. It is nevertheless a very enjoyable read and an important further extension and elaboration of the Old Kingdom world.

 

The content of this novella is not part of the ongoing story of the Abhorsens as such nor does it involve the principal characters of any of the other volumes. However it does contribute new aspects to the topography, sociology and history of the Old Kingrom in vivid detail and as such further enriches the whole. Again, too, it treats of a young protagonist with whom easy identification is most effectively engendered. This time it is a young man, Morghan, who had been physically abused and emotionally neglected in his upbringing, who now seeks to establish an identity for himself and to carve out a significant role for himself in the world.

 

Although short, To Hold the Bridge still manages to engross the reader for a while in the magnificently imaginative creation that is the world of the Old Kingdom. It succeeds beautifully too in engendering involvement in the fate of a protagonist with whom it is easy to identify. Is is also far more positive in its outcome that Clariel. It may not share the greatness of the rest of the sequence, however, for those who do want to save the world, in their fantasies at least, this extra read is a wonderful quick fix.

 

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Song for a Scarlet Runner by Julie Hunt

Despite Australia having such a strong tradition of quality writing for children, comparatively few books by their wonderful authors seem to get onto bookshop shelves here in the UK. Of course best sellers like Garth Nix and John Flanagan are exceptions as is the brilliant Morris Gleitzman. (His Once/Now/Then/After sequence is undoubtedly a very great contribution to children's literature.) It is a delight too when treasures by fine writers such as Sonia Harnet and Karen Foxlee get published here. (See my post on Ophelia and the Marvellous Boy from March '15.) But I do know that there are many other wonderful Antipodean writers of MG and YA fiction of whom we hear far too little little over here.

It is therefore a great pleasure to discover that a real gem like Tasmanian writer Julie Hunt's latest novel is readily available online, even though not directly published in the UK; enough in fact to overcome my usual scruples about circumventing physical bookshops. Song for a Scarlet Runner has been shortlisted for a number of awards in Australia, and this is totally understandable; it is a very original, imaginative and engaging fantasy. Children here, indeed children anywhere, deserve the opportunity to have their reading experience enriched by it.

One of the qualities I value highly in new children's fiction is a degree of originality - providing of course that this is linked with quality - and this book certainly has originality aplenty. It is, refreshingly, not yet another of those fantasies where a child discovers that he/she has special powers and is destined to save the world from unspeakable evil. Far from it. In fact its general tone is something far closer to Fairy Tale, and perhaps even closer to traditional folktales. It treats, at heart, with a young girl, Peat, who is forced from her poor but cozy home to 'seek her fortune' in unfamiliar environments. Deep in the strange marshlands she is apprenticed to a storytelling wise woman. However she is subsequently used as payment for a magical pact with the sinister 'Siltman' and taken by him to an undying but unspeakably bleak alternative world. The principal thrust of the story then revolves around her actions to escape and undo the pact.

Of course this story takes elements from older tales, grounding the telling in its own traditions. However Julie Hunt reimagines everything vividly afresh. The language in which the story is told is not the rather impersonal, event-driven style of actual Fairy Tale, rather everything is conjured up in the writer's, and hence the reader's, mind in evocatively rich detail. Throughout, a sense of place, indeed of many different places, is wonderfully created. Peat's original home, and the humdrum but comfortable life she has there with with her cows; the eerily misty marshlands; the incredible, bustling underground/overground city which is the 'hub' of this imagined world; the central and powerful river; the desolate landscape of the Siltman's 'Ever'; all these are vividly painted fantasyscapes which will linger long with any reader.

This whole created world is peopled, too, with a rich range of memorable characters, brought to life with engaging originality. Central Peat, is both feisty and vulnerable. In many ways she is the classic girl protagonist, and this helps the reader to identify with every moment of her journey through the story. We laugh with her, dream with her, cringe with her, weep with her, almost breathe with her. It is brilliant storytelling. The companions who join her quest, an unpredictable creature she calls the sleek and an ancient boy with a charmingly antiquated way of speaking, are far from conventional though and add both humour and novelty. Whilst the representation of nightmare that is the Siltman is drawn with convincing chill, many of the book's other characters are neither wholly good nor wholly bad and show illuminating humanity.

Of course it is no happenstance that the novel has the feeling of a traditional tale because at its heart this is a story about storytelling, about the power of story itself. This alone would be enough to make the book a very important and powerful read. Like all great children's books, however, it is also about being a child, about growing up, and about learning what life most essentially means. It is both life affirming and life enhancing. This it achieves with affecting understanding, whilst still keeping within the bounds of what is accessible to its intended young readers.

It is rather nice too that Song for a Scarlet Runner does what it does and is what it is within a single volume, without pretention to develop into a trilogy or an even longer sequence. It is a big book in a small space. It is clever and imaginative. It is important in what it has to say about the magic of story and of life. Above all it is hugely entertaining and enjoyable.

 

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