Fiction: May 2006 Archives

Cat Weatherill’s language leaps lithe and lively with the flared flair of a fire-cracker. Like its predecessor “Barkbelly” had before it, “Snowbone” focuses on the world of the Ashenpeakers, a wooden people hatched in fire from eggs.

Like the vestigial veins of snow that cling upon the earth, Snowbone is strong and determined with beliefs at heart that are not easily melted or made to vanish. The world she is born into is one of bias and prejudice where her people serve as stock in the slave trade.

With a greed fuelled by elixir-like tree-sap, as well as imposing servitude upon their waking days, the slavers also desecrate the sacred groves of trees, the entities all Ashenpeakers are destined to become once they move on. With a keen sense of morality and a crew of friends to aid her, Snowbone sets out on a quest to bring about an end to the trade.

Snowbone charst further still the richly imaginative world that was created in the first novel. Although Barkbelly himself makes a cameo appearance, this is very much a story that stands alone. Cat’s written style is fast-paced and lively showing a deft awareness of the story and intrigue that lies behind every situation and each scenario. It is a fast-paced adventure with a profound message about the nature of freedom and liberty.

Like its predecessor before it, “Snowbone” has all the feel of a true classic.

“They call them by so many names. The refugees. The sans-papiers. The stateless. Whatever they call them, they cannot leave them without shelter. That would not be correct.”

All too often reportage by the popular press of those seeking asylum presents the public with an image laden only with leaden value judgements – asylum seekers are seen solely as vagrants. Little surprise then that such instantly reactionary accounts all-too-easily fuel the types of hatred and intolerance that the far-right breeds.

Through their ability to make us think and feel vicariously, stories offer us the opportunity to explore more fully backgrounds and circumstances to the events that surround us everyday… they offer us an ever-widening outlook for our world-view. Guardian Children’s Ficton award winner Rachel Anderson’s latest book, “Red Moon” is one such title. It is a richly textured novel with an unadorned prosaic style that belies its intense emotional impact.

Fathered by the Scottish Douglas and French Anne-Marie, Hamish is an unusual, thoughtful boy. Never having played football, suffering from asthma and always handing his homework in on time, it is perhaps small wonder he has no friends amongst his peers and thereby has a somewhat insular approach to life.

After Douglas is killed by blacks, Hamish and his mother move to France where she is able to work upon her dissertation. The move appears a successful one and their new life seems – initially – idyllic, although it quickly becomes apparent that this calm is the eye-of-the-narrative-storm…

Running in tandem alongside this is the story of Ahmed or – slightly less politely – Ali, as he later becomes known. Academically gifted, Ahmed’s ambition for his future is to become a respected teacher. This is shattered, however, once the militia take over the teaching compound. From a community that is able to offer no assurance of safety to its citizens, Ahmed begins a journey to seek refuge, shelter and protection. His voyage takes him by truck and by boat, eventually depositing him, washed ashore onto a French beach near the university where Hamish and his mother are staying.

Inevitably, the eventual union between the two boys is initially a difficult one, Hamish is frustrated by Ahmed’s reticence to communicate and later by the increasing demands that Ahmed begins to make of Hamish.

“Red Moon” is a novel that challenges consideration into perceptions of our fellow-beings, its clever shifts in perspective avoid it becoming moralising and yield from the reader unbridled compassion not only towards Ahmed, but also towards Hamish. Both boys have faced trauma and loss, but through the geography and social positioning of their respective births, one has been supported and nurtured, whilst the other left to fend for himself, to find for himself and fight for himself, for his own freedom. That the two interwoven narrative perspectives shift from being recorded in different typographical fonts towards the same by the end, provides oblique reference that this has been successful.

Through its multi-layered scrutiny of ‘language’, ‘residency’ and ‘asylum’, concepts of ‘nationhood’ and ‘race’ are necessarily explored and assumptions challenged through the story. This in itself is enviable given the recent YouGov poll carried out prior to the local elections on 4th May which found 7% of people were ready to vote for the British Nationalist Party and 24% had either considered doing so before, or thinking about it now. Compassion can serve as both prevention and cure to intolerance; it is present here in abundance.

“parents almost always want what’s best for their children. They just don’t always know what that is.”

Strong of mind, sometimes of body and certainly in determination are the Penderwick sisters – a children’s literature dream-team comprising of four children and, of course, the obligatory dog. Rosalind is the eldest, next in line is Skye, following by Jane and the youngest Batty, not forgetting Hound (who, perhaps needless to say, is the dog).

Elements of this timeless feeling novel will doubtless feel familiar to keen readers in the field of children’s books. The children’s eagerness to help and to suffer mishap and misadventure along the way is highly reminiscent of Edith Nesbit’s Bastable family; middle daughter Jane’s writing ambition and the sisterly bonds between the girls bring to mind Louisa May Alcott’s March family, Arundel’s gardens a place for exploration, growth and healthy development bring to mind the grounds of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s Misselthwaite Manor and the novel’s decidedly child-centric story is undoubtedly Blyton-esque!

It is strength of character that makes “The Penderwicks” exceptional. Mrs Tifton becomes a genuinely formidable and fearsome arch-rival just as her son, Jeffrey, becomes a true friend and somebody whom the girls seek to rescue from the grasp of his over-bearing mother. “The Penderwicks” boasts the familiarity of finding oneself amidst old-friends and has the feel of a classic.

Set in Afghanistan in the months following September 11th and endorsed by Amnesty International, here is a book to contribute to a better understanding. Alternate chapters give us the stories of two heroines. Najmah, an Afghan girl, sees her father and brother conscripted to the Taliban, and her mother and baby brother killed in an American air raid. Lost and alone, she begins the dangerous journey through the mountains to Pakistan, where she hopes to find her family again. Elaine, an American woman, is also alone. Living in Pakistan after converting to Islam and marrying an Afghan doctor, she has not heard from him since he left to establish a hospital. Whilst she waits she teaches refugee children under the persimmon tree in her garden.

The two different viewpoints work well. From Najmah we get a picture of everyday life in rural Afghanistan. Staples draws on her experiences as a UPI reporter in Afghanistan and Pakistan to paint a picture of day-to-day life rich in fascinating and evocative details. Set against this normality the accounts of the death of Najmah’s mother and baby brother are particularly powerful and moving. From Elaine (known as Nusrat) we get a view of the contrasts between Western and Middle Eastern culture. By giving us an insight into two hearts and minds Staples also shows us the similarities, in a wonderful celebration of our common humanity.

When at last Najmah and Nusrat do find each other, their shared feelings of anxiety and loss, plus their shared interest in the stars, gives them the comfort and strength they need. Don’t expect a happy ending, Staples is a realist. But she shows that hard truths can be accepted, with courage and dignity.

Former food marketer Ian Hills’ debut novel, “The Toxic Toadburger Conspiracy” opens dramatically with 14-year-old protagonist Eddy Tumble choking to death on a roast potato. This book is a frenetic blend of fantasy and realism. Following an at once unfortunate and unceremonious demise amidst grey bread sauce, Eddy Tumble is resurrected by alien Interferons who supply him with a super-powered stomach. His quest is then to assuage the megalomaniacal Marcellus Guzzle’s, president of Gut Bucket Holdings, plans for world domination.

Gut Bucket are purveyors of the triple-tiered-toadburger (served with tadpole relish), a culinary concoction laced with rabbit juice an ingredient whose powers prove hypnotic against children.

This book is a curious mix of gut-wrenching and nausea-inducing horror and the horrific, of humour, fast-paced action and insightful social comment and expose about the fast-food industries that have developed around us. There is much here to entertain yet also much to think about.

If social pressure is to be exerted in order that the ethics and morals of multi-national fast-food outlets are to be developed more responsibly, fiction forms an ideological club through which knowledge and awareness can be disseminated effectively to young people. A sequel “Revenge of the Refuse Rats” will follow and further details on the book, its inspiration and author can be found at www.toxictoad.co.uk.