The Riddle of Stars, a trilogy by Patricia A. McKillip

It is best to review these three titles as a trilogy á la Lord of the Rings, rather than three separate novels. Series fiction has become so popular in the children’s and young adult literary world that we have forgotten the joy of a good trilogy, which combines the longevity of narrative that series fiction attempts to supply with a story that is well structured and coherent: with a beginning, a middle (climax, change of scene, rising action, another climax, another change of scene and rising action), and an end (a final climax, dénouement, and ultimately great satisfaction for the reader). Series fiction, on the other hand, often lacks the solid structure that leads to reader satisfaction: because it is written without a solid plan in the initial stages, it seldom forms as cohesive and satisfying a narrative. Don’t remind me that Dickens (among others) wrote his novels piecemeal this way, weekly, changing his plot to satisfy his readers’ opinions as he went along… I firmly believe he would have been even greater had he not suffered under such constraints!

To continue. I have not read The Riddle of Stars trilogy since I was a teen, but I cannot think why not: it was one of my absolute favourites, second perhaps only to Lord of the Rings. When I picked it up again last week, I remembered why I loved it so much. Even though I remember the essential plot, I can no longer remember the details, and the story and the world McKillip has created pulled me deep within: I ran with the vesta; I became a tree; I wept with Raederle… No trilogy or series since this—except perhaps K.V. Johansen’s Warlocks of Talverdin—has constructed for me such a complete, satisfying world, mythology, and backstory to the current narrative.

   In The Riddlemaster of Hed (1976), we meet Morgan, Prince of Hed. Morgan’s title means that he is bound irrevocably and immutably by a deep magic to his land. Not until his death—and then equally irrevocably—does his rule pass to his land-heir. But Morgan is also a Riddle Master, sent away from his agrarian homeland to study in the city of Caithnard with students from all the lands in the realm. He is torn between his identity as ruler of Hed—a land and culture that he truly understands and loves—and the three stars on his forehead that appear to mark him as something other than a ruler of cattle, pigs, and their keepers. Ultimately, he has to choose whether to pursue or abandon the riddle that is his identity. In McKillip’s world, philosophy, history, and belief are both bound and explained by the riddles the learnèd ask of each other, and their answers. Morgan has been trained in this world as much as his princedom, but there are riddles that even he cannot answer. He journeys north to Erlenstar Mountain, to seek the High One of the Realm, the only one who can answer the Riddle of his Stars, and his identity. En route he meets and befriends a number of rulers of other kingdoms; these friendships  will serve him well in his future struggles. But when he reaches the apparent end of his quest, the final words we are given are “Oh, no!” There his tale—at least in this volume—ends.

In Heir of Sea and Fire (1977), we return south to Raederle, Morgan’s intended, and the political struggles in which the world is embroiled now that the Prince of Hed has disappeared. While Raederle’s father seeks Morgan in his own way, Raederle and the two other women who love Morgan—the warrior Lyra and Morgan’s sister Tristan—abandon the pattern of their lives to seek him, and the answers to the fate that awaits their world. Parallelling Morgan’s search for identity, Raederle seeks to understand her own heritage, to learn why her wise and loving father made an oath to marry her to the man who could win a contest of Riddles with the shade of Aum of Peven, a great King and Riddle Master. She begins to comprehend her true nature, and to fear it, as much as—or more than—she fears losing Morgan.

In Harpist in the Wind (1979), while Raederle has learned her true name and nature, Morgan still struggles to determine who he is, and why the harpist Deth, whom he loved, had betrayed him so cruelly. The shape changers who pursue him to the corners of the realm, the evil Riddle Master who seeks to destroy him, even his own nature seems to battle against the peace he seeks for himself and his world. Slowly he integrates his abilities with self-knowledge, battling against self-doubt, until in the final moment—almost too late—he learns his true name, and his real place in the natural order of his world.

The Discovery of Socket Greeny (2010), by Tony Bertauski

Lately I’ve been downloading a large number of free ebooks from BookBub, or Kobo, or anywhere I can: my book budget has been exhausted. I have discovered, though not surprisingly, that my quality of reading has thus dropped significantly, and a large proportion of the free books I delete after reading the first couple of pages. Every once in a while, thankfully, one like Tony Bertauski’s The Discovery of Socket Greeny comes along to rejuvenate my joy of reading on the Kobo. The book was first released in 2010, so it was not a “straight-to-almost-free” book like so many, but at first my response was “What on earth are they doing offering this for free?” followed by “I wonder how much the sequels are going to cost me?” For there are always sequels in children’s and YA fiction these days, it seems: but I have lamented this situation before.  There are, in fact, sequels to The Discovery of Socket Greeny, although all three books were released in 2010: The Discovery of Socket Greeny in July, The Training of Socket Greeny in September, and The Legend of Socket Greeny in December. Despite the sequels, I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the first book was, in fact, sufficiently self-contained to satisfy my narrative needs completely. There were directions that Bertauski could take his story, more that could be told, but it is not necessary to read more to find closure.

The conception and plot of Socket Greeny are original and engaging. Picture a YA version of Neuromancer with shades of Little Brother, Ender’s Game, and Feed. How could I not read on? Perhaps, too, I liked the immediate immersion into the virtual world of MMOGs (massively multi-player online games).  The story opens with three teens hooked into virtualmode to study, but instead hacking into someone else’s virtual world to battle. Bertauski’s description of the transitional process is both a little familiar (see Neuromancer) and yet unique.

The banter between Socket, Streeter, and Socket’s girlfriend, Chute, about the wisdom of their enterprise reveals the closeness that exists in this triad of friends:

“What are we doing here?” I asked
“We’re going to get our kill on.”
“I just got pardoned for fighting. We get caught, just stamp my suspension.” …
I looked at Chute. “Did you know we were doing this?”
“He didn’t tell me. If you were in class on time, he wouldn’t have told you, either.” …

I have listened to the teens upstairs: Bertauski’s characters are real.

Hacked into the Rime world, something goes terribly, unexpectedly wrong. Their sims are almost destroyed: a shadow forms that only Socker can see (“You’re brain damaged. Shadow sims can’t stabilize in this environment”); he begins to feel his sim; and time stands still. Cut to the three of them in detention for misuse of virtualmode time, when Socker is pulled away by his mother for a “family emergency.” His friends don’t see him again for 8 months.

The discovery of Socker Greeny—who and what Socker is—underlies the remainder of the novel. But it is not the mystery that grabs the reader so much as our affection for the character: his combination of youthful bravado and insecurity, his compassion, his need for love, his anger, and even his outright fear. His internal monologue sits comfortably beside his descriptions of all that he sees and experiences in the new reality he finds himself in.

Ultimately Socker does discover who he is, essentially, as well as learning the truth about his broken family, and his mother’s disinterest and even coldness towards him. Starved of affection for so long, it is no wonder that he clings to his friends just that little bit, emotionally. His need is mirrored in his unswerving commitment to the friendship, though, and in the end it is the combination of their talents that helps them to fight for their lives almost successfully… Not that everyone dies, of course, but it honestly is not obvious that they will all survive. Bertauski does give us the satisfactory happy ending (of course, we knew that Socket lives on, or there wouldn’t be sequels), but the danger feels real, and the escape from it uncontrived, if expectedly fortuitous. The world has changed irrevocably for Socker and his friends: they will never again be the team that they have always been, but they—and we—are okay with that.

Cape Town (2012), by Brenda Hammond

This review was first published in Resource Links Magazine, “Canada’s national journal devoted to the review and evaluation of Canadian English and French resources for children and young adults.” It appears in volume 18.1

Cape Town

The mother of my best friend growing up was a ballet dancer in South Africa before immigrating to Canada. The stories she told came back to life as I read Brenda Hammond’s Cape Town, so similar are the feelings the protagonist Renee has towards her art. But while dancing is Renee’s raison d’être, it is not the central theme of the novel, which spans the year between February 1989 and February 1990: a time when all nations’ eyes were on South African politics and the issue of apartheid. In September 1989, F.W. de Klerk was voted into power; on 11 February 1990, Nelson Mandela was finally released from 27 years in prison; on 8 June 1990, the state of emergency was lifted; between 1990 and 1993, de Klerk’s government systematically ended over 40 years of legislated apartheid. The hope that Renee and her boyfriend Andrew feel in the new Prime Minister’s commitment “to creating a new South African free of oppression and discrimination” (323) resonates strongly at the conclusion of their story. We have lived through the struggle, seen through Renee’s naïve Afrikaans eyes. So carefully depicted is the balance between political struggle and Renee’s own internal struggles that even readers who did not live through that historical moment will understand both the horrors and the hope that surged through South Africa in the early 1990s.
Renee Pretorius is the ideal character to explore the issue of apartheid from a psychologically safe perspective, rendering the horrors of apartheid moderately accessible to a young adult audience. Renee is a young Afrikaans girl, from a traditional rural family, recently arrived in Cape Town to begin her studies at the School of Dance at the University of Cape Town. Her conservative religious and social attitudes sit uncomfortably with her innate humanism, and she soon finds herself not only communicating with, but befriending a Coloured student as well as falling in love with a young political activist of British descent. Renee and Andrew’s relationship is adeptly handled: their conflicts are based on a real social chasm, and the reader is never quite sure whether their feelings for one another will be enough to overcome the vast differences in their cultural backgrounds. Underlying all of her experiences and expressions of discomfort, though, are Renee’s strong feelings of social justice and philia, most powerfully expressed in her unquestioning love of her family’s Black servant, Kokodais.
While the dilemma Hammond creates for her characters is alleviated in the final pages, the providential political moment comes after Renee has made her decision regarding her path in life. We are thus left with both a happy ending and a firm belief that Renee has developed a strong social and political consciousness: she knows who she is, and who she wants to become.

Treasure Island (1883), by Robert Louis Stevenson

I have recently reviewed Adira Rotstein’s Little Jane and the Nameless Isle (2013), the protagonist of which is Long John Silver’s granddaughter. Significantly, her father’s name was Jim… I knew enough of Stevenson’s story to tell where the allusions lay—and what they were to—but it struck me as oddly amiss that I had never actually read Treasure Island as a child. Finding a copy in my bedroom when visiting my cousin last week, I set about to remedy the omission.

It was strange to read—finally—a book that I have seen reproduced in both live action and animated film, as well as heard of for so long. Treasure Island is the source of so many of our cultural tropes about pirates: the peg leg, the parrot on the shoulder, “yo ho ho and a bottle of rum,” and X marks the spot. So I was not blind to the significance of Long John Silver when he appeared, a precognition that I thought detracted from my reading experience. As the story went on, though, I discovered that there is a good reason that this is one of English literature’s classics. Stevenson’s characters are as intricately developed as his plot; the narrative chicanery young Jim encounters and sometimes creates are brilliantly conceived and wonderfully executed. The language, too, is accessible and interesting: young readers will learn not only the tropes, but also some real information about life—especially sailing and navigation—in the mid eighteen hundreds.

I think I didn’t like Treasure Island as much as did Captain Marryat’s Children of the New Forest (1847), perhaps because I like camping in the forest more than life on the high seas, but I really do understand why children even now love Stevenson’s novels.

Winter Shadows (2010), by Margaret Buffie

A perfect book to read right now, when shadows are lengthening so early in the day: the air is crisp, our hands thawed by warm breath that hangs in a cloud before dissipating. These days, I can easily imagine Beatrice, “huddled under a pile of buffalo robes” (1) as we first meet her. I have never lived in the prairies, being from the mountains of BC, but Buffie’s descriptions are so vivid that I can see Beatrice’s world, and Cassandra’s more modern version, and feel the difference between the two eras they lived in. I am not by nature adept at creating images from descriptive texts; I generally get a strong feeling for characters in books, but have a problem visualizing their settings. I recognize this as a failing in my role as reader, and am thus overjoyed when an author’s descriptions are effective enough for me to really see the world she creates.

Buffie’s setting carries her carefully designed plot along with it; her ability to intertwine her modern realist stories with the paranormal connections that are the vehicle for growth and learning does not seem to wane. As in her other stories, in Winter Shadows emotional support comes to Cassandra through discovering the truth of Beatrice’s life. Cass is facing the first Christmas with a new step-mother and annoying younger step-sister; she feels betrayed by her father, abandoned by her dead mother, righteous in her anger, and justified in her acting out. While we do not necessarily agree with her—from an adult perspective—we can see why she feels and does what she does… Teen readers would undoubtedly not only sympathize, but empathize with her position, her attitude, and her behaviour. Buffie contrasts Cass’s modern familial problems with those of a young Métis girl, Beatrice, in 1856. Beatrice has returned from school in the East to St. Cuthbert’s, Manitoba, to live with her father and his new wife, Ivy. Ivy, like Cass’s new stepmother, Jean, does not share a culture with her new husband. Beatrice calls her “puritanical” (20), and certainly she has no love of—let alone respect for—Native cultures, including Métis. Beatrice’s story is presented as a combination of conflicts: she suffers both as a daughter with a new step-mother, and as a Métis who loves her grandmother and her culture, yet sees it denigrated by many in her community, including her step-mother. Cass, living in her ancestral home that was also Beatrice’s, begins to see visions of Beatrice’s life, as Beatrice does of Cass. The connection between the two young women causes both of them to doubt not only their sanity, at some level, but also their instinctive emotional responses to their world. Learning of the cultural and social prejudices with which Beatrice suffers helps Cass to put her own problems into perspective; seeing visions of the comparatively strong and emancipated Cass helps Beatrice to stand strong in the choices she has to make.

Layered beneath her plot, Buffie has created a narrative of mid-nineteenth-century Métis culture that is part of a resurgence of and thus growing interest in the Métis historical narrative. Another admirable author in this vein is Jacqueline Guest, whose Belle of Batoche (2004) and Outcasts of River Falls (2012) are more straight-forward historical narratives of Canadian Métis life. I’m not sure if there are others, but these three novels speak strongly to the need for the Métis narrative to be told, to be reconstructed in a way that provides ready access for modern young readers. Winter Shadows, with its combination of carefully researched history and language, and Buffie’s as-always insightful interpretation of modern youth and the issues they face, is for me the perfect combination of reality and metaphor, modernity and paranormal history. While I do not love (understand? identify with? appreciate?) Cass as much as I do Frances Rain, I believe Cass speaks as strongly to young girls today as Frances Rain did almost 25 years ago.

Little Brother (2008), by Cory Doctorow

Little Brother plays to one of my worst fears, even a phobia: the abuse of power by petty officials. Border crossings are particularly troubling for me, as for years I was exactly the sort of person into whose backpack less-reputable individuals might slip something, to be reclaimed on the other side. I am not usually paranoid, but I must admit to repeated anxiety every time we approached a border or airport security in our years travelling around Europe and Asia.  So imagine my response to the opening scenes of Little Brother, in which Marcus and his friends are arrested as terrorists, merely for being in the wrong place at the wrong time. Cory Doctorow’s intent of causing the reader to question the balance of power in post-9/11 America was thus particularly effective for me. I almost put the book down, so worried was I of where the novel might take me. Then I remembered I have read all of Robert Cormier’s novels (one after another—do that and try to avoid depression and trauma), how bad could it get? I am so glad I persevered, as Doctorow’s protagonist is a brilliantly constructed example of my favourite type of teen geek, one who understands his own ability with technology—the power of the future—and yet is young and naïve enough not to understand fully the political powers that control his reality. He is a combination of so many real teens and the rarer breed: young hot-shot techno-geeks. His type—and thus his character—fascinates me.

Marcus (aka M1K3Y in 1337-speak) takes on the American Department of Homeland Security and wins: a situation that should not be possible and in most narrative instances would not be plausible. Doctorow, however, constructs his plot carefully, and we believe in Marcus’s ability to orchestrate the pranks he does, as well as the governmental responses to them. Power in the novel shifts back and forth between the teen rebels and the DHS until finally Marcus realizes the severity of what he has started, the degree to which others are suffering for his cause. The ideological aspects of his decisions are not glossed over; he has to seriously consider his own motivations, what he is asking of those around him as well as supporters he has never met. In the end, he does what I always want teen protagonists to do at such times, but so few: he goes to sympathetic adults for advice and assistance. Little Brother is thus not merely about teenaged power wielded against the adult world, as so many YA novels are, but about the conscious activism of individuals with integrity against corruption and the abuse of power. By making Marcus’s situation a part of a greater ideological battle, Doctorow raised the bar for YA literature. I’m not saying Little Brother is unique in this—Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games series, Scott Westerfeld’s Uglies series, and Cheryl Rainfield’s Hunted spring to mind—but it seems that YA literature tends toward the self-absorbed teen perspective in a way that is both present and yet transcended in Little Brother.

The Ropemaker (2001), by Peter Dickinson

This is an epic narrative about the transition from one era to the next in a fantasy world.  The new era is ushered in by the passing of a token from one powerful magician to the next, and in this case facilitated by our protagonists, who must journey out of the comfort of their pastoral valley existence to locate the magician who can help them heal their valley… so they think.  But they are caught up on the affairs of the Empire, and set in motion the changes that herald the coming of the new era.

It is well written, but a bit long for the tale.  Unlike Lord of the Rings, there are not enough politics to sustain the length of the book, and it drags at points.  Regardless, it is a fascinating and original story, and does lead one to want to read the sequel, Angel Isle (2007). That is not to say the ending is unsatisfying—the text stands alone completely; the sequel must be another story in the same setting, but not requiring a connection to the intricate and complete plot of The Ropemaker. It is on my self, so maybe I should read it next…

The Children of the New Forest (1847), by Captain Marryat

This is, of course, a modern cover… I unfortunately do not own a 1st edition, much as I would love to.

Captain Frederick Marryat (1792-1848) is well known as a Victorian novelist as well as an officer in the Royal Navy. His semi-autobiographical Mr. Midshipman Easy (1836) and his later Masterman Ready (1841)—both naval adventures—are perhaps his most famous works, but he wrote a total of 26 novels beginning with The Naval Officer in 1829. His final two novels—The Little Savages and Valerie—were published posthumously in 1848. It is interesting to note that Marryat spent time in both the USA and Canada, and in fact took part in the British defense during the 1837 Rebellion in Upper Canada. His novels set in North America thus exhibit far more authenticity than those of, for example, G. A. Henty’s later “Boys’ Own” style Imperialist adventure tales.

Published in 1847, The Children of the New Forest was the last novel released while the author still lived. Unlike his more swashbuckling naval and military adventure novels, Children of the New Forest is historical, set during the English Civil War and Cromwellian rule in England. A Victorian historical novel appeals on a number of grounds, but I must admit that I had long put off reading Children of the New Forest, thinking that it would be a significant investment in time and energy, Victorian boys’ novels being what they are: wordy and often unnecessarily pompous or overly didactic in tone. Those that are not, I have found—per Henty and Haggard—are often almost offensively Imperialist. This renders them fascinating to study, but not so enjoyable to read. Still, when I was at a loss for what to read on the bus coming home from the office a few weeks ago, I pulled Marryat’s novel off the shelf and began at the beginning. By the time I reached home an hour later, I was a quarter of the way through the book and thoroughly engaged. I finished it within three days.

The story tells of the four children of the loyalist Colonel Beverley, who is killed defending King Charles I against the Cromwellian army in the Battle of Naseby in 1645. His home is subsequently destroyed, and the

This frontispiece of the Beverley mansion burning was created by Marryat’s son (http://www.bl.uk/collections/early/victorian/children/childn3.html).

children presumed dead. To keep them safe, however, a loyal retainer has taken them to his woodsman’s cottage deep in the New Forest, where they grow to semi-adulthood before his death of old age. The eldest son takes a post as secretary to a sympathetic Forest Warden, and eventually becomes embroiled in the Royalist plans to restore the monarchy. Hidden identities, love affairs, politics, loyalties and legalities: Children of the New Forest has it all, presented in prose that is fluid, with descriptions that are lush and poetic. Perhaps it is because I do start out liking Regency and Victorian novels—when I have the leisure to devote to them—but despite expectations I found The Children of the New Forest a lively, entertaining, yet informative tale that I strongly recommend to any modern reader—of any age—interested in British history, childhood studies, or just a well-written tale of honour, loyalty, and survival in hard times.

Howl (2011), by Karen Hood-Caddy

This review was first published in Resource Links Magazine, “Canada’s national journal devoted to the review and evaluation of Canadian English and French resources for children and young adults.” It appears in volume 17.3.

Howl

In Howl, Karen Hood-Caddy has created a story that will resonate strongly with many young readers, populated as it is with psychologically realistic characters whom everyone will recognize.  The protagonist, Robin, is both strong and insecure, having recently lost her mother; Robin’s older sister is a typical teen, dealing with loss by acting out, and her younger brother, “Squirm,” is both annoying and loveable.  Her father, a veterinary, is struggling to provide support for his children and hold his own life together after the loss of his wife. The crucial aspect of his own grieving is that he moves his family from Winnipeg, Manitoba, to northern Ontario where his mother lives on a large property beside a lake. Combine the complicated (and successfully portrayed) dynamics of a grieving family with bullying neighbours and growing (and not quite legal) wild-life rescue operation, and we have a novel rich with possibilities.  It may sound like there is too much going on, but Hood-Caddy balances the different, equally important, aspects of Robin’s new rural life perfectly: we see life from Robin’s young perspective, glossed by sparse and effective wisdom from her “eccentric” grandmother, Griff.

Through her involvement in a school project on ecological consciousness, and her activities helping to heal injured wild animals, Robin eventually learns to trust in happiness again.  The threats she encounters—both socially and legally—are dealt with in ways that readers will perceive as possible in their own lives.  More than just an engaging story of a young girl growing back into strength after trauma, Howl presents the reader with a map—both psychologically and logistically—of how young people can grow towards maturity and efficacy within their world.

There Will Be Wolves (1992), by Karleen Bradford

Karleen Bradford has recreated the People’s Crusade with a careful attention to historicity: her characters are believable and stay true to their medieval sensibilities.  Even in the end, Ursula’s view of her world remains consistent.  It is a monumental achievement on the part of the author; creating believable characters from such a harsh, unforgiving period of history is no easy task.  The plot itself skims over much of the actual pilgrimage, focusing on essential points to help the reader understand the changes that occurred in the atmosphere of the Crusade and the attitudes of the People Crusaders.  I would recommend this far before Karen Cushman’s Catherine, Called Birdy (1994) in terms of representation of this period; it lies between the comfort of Cushman’s novel and the graphic warfare of John Wilson’s Heretic series (also exceptional).  For the more sensitive reader, Bradford is perfect: the reality is reflected, the horror is portrayed, but the graphic details are minimized.