Kit’s Wilderness, by David Almond
A beautifully written and intricate English children’s book. Kit’s family returns to their ancestral coal mining town to take care of his grandfather after his grandmother died. At home, his grandfather tells him stories of mining and spirits of the mines; at school, he falls in with Allie, a flamboyant girl who wants to be an actress, and Askew, a strange boy who plays the game of Death, in which the children enact being dead. When Kit plays, he puts one foot in the actual world of spirits, and thereafter is haunted by the spirits of children who died in the mines.
For a relatively short book and fast read, this has dizzying layers of complexity. A journey to some sort of underworld is enacted, in separate but related plotlines, by 1) Kit’s grandfather, into both memory and forgetting, 2) the miners, to the past in terms of the layers of fossils they tunnel through and also into the literal underground, 3) a school play based on the Snow Queen, 4) a story about a caveman that Kit is writing, 5) the schoolchildren, in the game called Death which involves going into a pit, 6) Askew, running away from life and literally going underground, 7) Askew’s father, into alcoholism, 8) Kit, into the spirit world, 9) Kit, Askew, and Allie, into the cave where Askew is hiding.
There’s also an incredible amount of character mirroring, doubling, and opposition; to take just two examples, Kit and Askew both bear the same names and ages of boys who died in the mines, and the story Kit is writing is simultaneously a version of Askew’s life, a version of Kit’s life, a magic spell to bring Askew back, Kit’s way of connecting with the past, and Kit’s ticket to his future: a life that will be different from the one his ancestors led.
This book won a whole lot of well-deserved awards. It’s a technical feat that’s also very enjoyable to read, rewarding without being difficult, numinous and moving.
Anyone read this or anything else by Almond? I have only read Skellig, which I recall shared a balance of grittiness and magic, good characterization of even minor characters, and a lot packed into a short length.
Kit's Wilderness
Crossposted to https://rachelmanija.dreamwidth.org/2234729.html. Comment here or there.
For a relatively short book and fast read, this has dizzying layers of complexity. A journey to some sort of underworld is enacted, in separate but related plotlines, by 1) Kit’s grandfather, into both memory and forgetting, 2) the miners, to the past in terms of the layers of fossils they tunnel through and also into the literal underground, 3) a school play based on the Snow Queen, 4) a story about a caveman that Kit is writing, 5) the schoolchildren, in the game called Death which involves going into a pit, 6) Askew, running away from life and literally going underground, 7) Askew’s father, into alcoholism, 8) Kit, into the spirit world, 9) Kit, Askew, and Allie, into the cave where Askew is hiding.
There’s also an incredible amount of character mirroring, doubling, and opposition; to take just two examples, Kit and Askew both bear the same names and ages of boys who died in the mines, and the story Kit is writing is simultaneously a version of Askew’s life, a version of Kit’s life, a magic spell to bring Askew back, Kit’s way of connecting with the past, and Kit’s ticket to his future: a life that will be different from the one his ancestors led.
This book won a whole lot of well-deserved awards. It’s a technical feat that’s also very enjoyable to read, rewarding without being difficult, numinous and moving.
Anyone read this or anything else by Almond? I have only read Skellig, which I recall shared a balance of grittiness and magic, good characterization of even minor characters, and a lot packed into a short length.
Kit's Wilderness
Crossposted to https://rachelmanija.dreamwidth.org/2234729.html. Comment here or there.