The Goblin’s Puzzle by Andrew S. Chilton

Sep25

The Goblin’s Puzzle: Being the Adventures of a Boy with No Name and Two Girls Called Alice by Andrew S. Chilton.

I was reminded of the movie and book The Princess Bride while reading this debut middle grade fantasy novel, and that is high praise indeed. For a book to remind one of The Princess Bride, it must be clever in a similar way to the the wit and wisdom of that classic. It is. I can also say that I wanted to see The Goblin’s Puzzle as a film and that I think it could be a good one. Other than The Princess Bride, which may or may not have been an inspiration, Mr. Chilton’s sources seem to be good and quite varied:

From the author’s website at Penguin Random House: “Andrew S. Chilton drew inspiration for The Goblin’s Puzzle from a wide variety of sources, ranging from The Hobbit to Monty Python to Aristotle’s Nicomachean Ethics. As a kid, he gobbled up fantasy novels and logic puzzles, and as an adult, he spent over ten years as a practicing lawyer before launching his career as a writer.”

The book stars a nameless slave boy, a girl called Plain Alice (to distinguish her from all the other Alices in the kingdom), Princess Alice, heir to the throne, and a goblin named (something long and complicated), Mennofar for short. The Boy is running for his life from an unfortunate incident that ended in the violent death of his master’s son. It really wasn’t The Boy’s fault, but it will be blamed on him anyway, and he feels quite guilty about breaking a lot of the 99 rules for being a good slave, most of which he can’t even remember. Meanwhile, Plain Alice, who wants to become a sage but can’t get an opportunity because she’s a girl, has been kidnapped by a dragon. And Princess Alice, who should have been the object of the dragon’s kidnapping, is worrying King Julian, her father, with her frequent giggling and lack of a serious education. The goblin, Mennofar, is running away, too, and he owes The Boy for his help in the goblin’s escape from captivity. But Mennofar is indeed a goblin, and “it is hard for a goblin and a human to be friends. Goblin honor and human honor are so very different.” Mennofar feels obligated to do something for The Boy, but his “goblin honor” also demands that he make the whole thing into a particularly difficult and complicated puzzle.

There’s a afterword to the book that explains a bit about the basics of the study of logic, which is the main theme and framework for the story. But it’s a subtle use of logic, not an in-your-face teaching of logic. (Don’t worry. If you aren’t at all interested in the study of logic, it’s still a great story, and you won’t be tricked into learning logic—much. Although goblins are kind of tricky that way.) I enjoyed the discussions between Mennofar and The Boy and between Plain Alice and the dragon, Ludwig, that were illustrations of the different aspects of logic, which is the study of how we prove things, according to Mr. Chilton. I might have guessed, if I had thought of it, that Mr. Chilton was a lawyer before he decided to write a book for middle grade logicians and fantasy lovers.

I also just liked this story. Do I have to prove that it’s a good book for this to be a good review or for you to believe me when I say that you would probably enjoy it, too? I don’t think so. After all, we’re humans, not goblins. We don’t have to be strictly logical. Or tricky.

Saturday Review of Books: September 24, 2016

Sep24

“What I like best is a book that’s at least funny once in a while… What really knocks me out is a book that, when you’re all done reading it, you wish the author that wrote it was a terrific friend of yours and you could call him up on the phone whenever you felt like it. That doesn’t happen much, though.” ~Catcher in the Rye by JD Salinger

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Viking’s Dawn by Henry Treece

Sep23

Henry Treece (b.1911, d.1966) was a British teacher, editor, and Army intelligence officer who became a poet and playwright, then a writer of historical fiction for children. Many of his books are set in early Britain, before the Norman conquest. Viking’s Dawn is the first book in a trilogy about the Vikings and their incursions into the British isles during the mid-eighth century.

In this novel Harald Sigurdsson, a Norse boy, signs onto a Viking ship, The Nameless, and agrees to serve its master, Thorkell Fairhair. As the ship sails out to plunder the coasts of England and Scotland, Harald sees men injured, drowned, and killed in battle, and Harald himself kills his first man with his Viking sword. I won’t give too many spoilers, but suffice it to say that voyage does not go as planned and the plunder is somewhat lacking.

Viking’s Dawn is a violent book, but the Viking life was a violent, and sometimes short, life. The story feels authentic, not watered down for young readers, but also not steeped in gratuitous blood and gore. If your young reader, middle grades through young adult, wants to get an idea of how real Vikings lived and fought and thought, this book is well-researched and detailed, without getting bogged down in too much explication to the detriment of action.

I would be interested to find and read Mr. Treece’s other two books in his Viking trilogy, The Road to Miklagard and Viking’s Sunset.

Grayling’s Song by Karen Cushman

Sep22

Just like her Newbery award winning book, The Midwife’s Apprentice, Karen Cushman’s new foray into fantasy/magical realism has a touch of medieval wisdom and a cartload of feminist historical perspective to bring to middle grade readers. The image of medieval “hedge witches” and “cunning folk” and “wise women” is rehabilitated and given respectability and even honor as Grayling, the daughter of one such herbalist and witch, goes on a journey to rescue her mother from an evil magic smoky shadow that has rooted her to the ground and is changing her into a tree.

Although it reminded me of the book I reviewed yesterday, Red by Liesl Shurtliff, this book was just a little too “witchy” for my tastes. In addition to Grayling’s mother, Hannah Strong, and Grayling herself, the story features a grumpy weather witch, an evil wannabe witch, an alluring enchantress, and a professor of divination, all of whom team up with Grayling to help her on her quest. I can like stories with witches—Baba Yaga, The Wizard of Oz, Harry Potter, Narnia’s White Witch—all are perfectly good stories in their own way. But this feminist version of medieval witches that reimagines them as harmless but wise healers and herbalists, and yet at the same has them wielding powers that are far from harmless . . . It’s just not my favorite storyline or characterization.

Grayling is the typical “strong female” character that’s all the rage nowadays. She tells a young man who tries to rescue her from drowning to quit rescuing her and let her rescue herself. She learns to rely on her own strength and courage, even when she doesn’t feel strong or courageous. One of the several songs that Grayling makes up during the course of the story to work her own kind of magic goes like this:

You cannot just sit here,
Dreaming and hoping,
March forward to battle
With pennants unfurled,
I call on your courage,
No fretting or moping.
Stand tall.
Stand tall.

If we stand alone,
It still must be done.
If it must be done,
You are the one.

That’s OK, as far as it goes, but something about it feels like a pep talk and leaves me wanting.

Nevertheless, there’s nothing really wrong with this coming of age story about a girl who leaves home to save her mother’s life, succeeds with the help of others, and returns to find that she’s outgrown the home she left. Amanda at The Willow Nook has a much better, and more positive, review of the book, and she makes some excellent points about the redemptive and heroic themes to be found in this short novel, only 200 pages. I predict it will find an audience, just not me.

Red by Liesl Shurtliff

Sep21

Red: The True Story of Red Riding Hood by Liesl Shurtliff.

In her author’s note at the end of the book, Ms. Shurtliff says that she wrote this story about Red and her Granny, the Witch of the Woods, in honor of her own grandmother who died while the writing of this fairy tale reimagined was still in progress. Somehow her grandmother’s death shook something loose in Ms. Shurtliff’s mind and enabled her to finish the book with its themes of living and dying, facing fear, and seeing things from different perspectives.

When Red goes to stay with her granny while her parents are away, she is happy to depend on Granny’s magic to ease the way and make things grow. However, when Granny falls sick, Red is determined to find the secret of eternal life, not for herself but for her beloved granny. Red is so afraid of life without Granny and of her own clumsy and sometimes dangerous attempts to make magic that she will do anything, except magic, to find a way to prolong Granny’s life.

With the unwelcome help of a blonde, curly-headed chatterbox named Goldie, Red sets off on a journey through the Woods on her own special magical path to find life for Granny. Along the way she learns about friendship (even with annoying chatterers), appearances (things are not always what they seem), and fear. What if a wolf can be Red’s closest friend? What if fear, not death, is the greatest enemy of all?

I really enjoyed this story of Red who is afraid that Granny will die and leave her alone, without Granny’s magical presence to comfort and sustain her. There were some wise themes embedded in the story, even though I’m not a fan of the whole “circle of life” philosophy that is employed by the author to explain the inevitability of death. Red does overcome her fears and come to accept that Granny, like everyone else, will die someday. And she does learn to see life and events from the perspective of others, including a grumpy dwarf and a harsh beast.

Favorite quotes:

“Some mistakes need to be made. Sometimes we have to fall down before we can stand up.”

” . . . you should never give up. Unless, of course, you’re doing something wrong, in which case you should give up entirely.”

“Fear doesn’t only twist our magic, it also makes us forget. It made me forget who I was, the strength and goodness I had inside me. But when I let go of my fear and faced what was before me, the memories came rushing back.”

“Funny, that we always told stories with wolves and beasts and demons as villains, but in real life it seemed the humans were always the worst enemies. You could be your own villain.”

Every Single Second by Tricia Springstubb

Sep20

“Twelve year old Nella Sabatini’s life is changing too soon, too fast.” Nella, who lives in an Italian American neighborhood with her very Italian American parents and her four “snot-nosed” little brothers, has one best friend, Clem, and one former best friend, Angela. When Angela’s troubled family brings trouble to the entire neighborhood, what will Nella do about Angela, Clem, Angela’s older brother, Anthony, and her own very mixed-up feelings and allegiances?

I liked this book. Really. The girls talk about important things—war, guns, God, time, change, and friendship—in a very natural and twelve year old way. And Nella’s life and relationships with her family and friends and great-grandmother and her friends’ families were also well-drawn and believable. I was drawn into the story, and I really wanted to know what would happen to these girls and their changing neighborhood.

However, there were two problems that got in the way of my enjoyment of this middle grade novel. First, one of the minor characters uses God’s name in vain (OMG). Why is this necessary in a middle grade novel, especially for a minor character who doesn’t get much character development anyway? It’s offensive to some people, and unnecessary, so leave it out.

Second, there were these little short interlude chapters in which a statue, named Jeptha A. Stone, tells what it would say if it could speak. A bird makes its nest in the statue’s lap. I have no idea how these interludes related to the main story. I’m a bit dense, I suppose, but I think the book would have been better with the statue thoughts edited out completely.

Then, there is the part that wasn’t problematic for me, but might be for others. The main crisis of the novel deals with an accidental shooting of a black man by a white (Italian) man, Angela’s older brother, Anthony. Anthony goes to jail, and everybody is appalled at his shooting of this young black man, implying or stating that the shooting was racially motivated. However, as far as Anthony and his family and Nella are concerned, the shooting was an accident. So, some people might be offended that the shooter is “innocent”, since many, at least some, shootings of young black men are racially motivated. Others might be concerned because Anthony is not totally exonerated, although he is a sympathetic character. Like all the news these days related to police and people of color and guns and shooting, it’s complicated. It makes the book itself timely, but subject to controversy and misunderstanding.

I recommend Every Single Second. Skip the sort of talking statue.

New Children’s Fiction in the Library: September, 2016

Sep19

I’m going to start posting here about the books that I acquire for my library. For those of you who don’t know I have a private subscription library in my home, mostly for homeschoolers, although others who are interested in quality books are welcome to visit or to join. I have a lot of older books that are no longer available from the public library as well as some new books that I think will stand the test of time.

Here’s an annotated list of some of the new/old books I’ve acquired (from thrift stores, used bookstores, library sales, donations) in the past month:

The Striped Ships by Eloise McGraw. In 1066 the Normans defeat the Saxons, and eleven year old Juliana, a Saxon miss, becomes a captive and a servant in a Norman castle. However, when she escapes captivity, she even comes to have a part in the creation of the famous Bayeaux Tapestry.

All in Good Time by Edward Ormondroyd. Sequel to Time at the Top. A young girl is granted three rides in a magic elevator that transports her to the end of the nineteenth century.

Hannah’s Fancy Notions: A Story of Industrial New England by Pat Rose. A short chapter book, historical fiction, about a young girl who helps her impoverished family by making hatboxes, or bandboxes as they were called, to sell to the mill girls of Lowell, Massachusetts in the early to mid-nineteenth century.

Winnie’s War by Jennie Moss. I used to have a copy of this book, but it got lost. Now, this World War I novel, set in Coward’s Creek (really Friendswood), Texas is back in my library. Semicolon review here.

The Boys of Blur by N.D. Wilson. This book, set in the Florida Everglades, alludes to Beowulf. Semicolon review here.

The Potato Chip Puzzles: The Puzzling World of Winston Breen by Eric Berlin. For readers who enjoy puzzles, games, wordplay, and mathematical dilemmas.

The Prisoner of Zenda by Anthony Hope. In this 1894 adventure novel, Rudolph Rassendyll’s life is interrupted by his unexpected involvement in the affairs of Ruritania whilst travelling through the town of Zenda. He is shortly on the way to Streslau, the capital, where he finds himself engaged in plans to rescue the imprisoned king.

Mr. Tucket by Gary Paulsen. Francis Alphonse Tucket, who is traveling on the Oregon Trail with his family, gets separated from the wagon train and kidnapped by a Pawnee raiding party. First in a five book series, will Francis ever get to Oregon and find his family?

2016 Middle Grade Fiction: Short Takes

Sep16

Lizzie and the Lost Baby, by Cheryl Blackford. (realistic fiction)I thought this one was a good little story. The themes of truth-telling and treating others with respect and forbearance were well integrated into the story. A family of gypsies accidentally lose their baby girl, left alone and immediately rescued in a pasture, and the nearby community (in England) treat them with disdain and prejudice. One child, Lizzie, stands up for what is right against all the adults who are perpetuating an injustice.

Mrs. Bixby’s Last Day by John David Anderson. (realistic fiction) Topher, Brand and Steve’s favorite teacher, Mrs. Bixby, announces she’s leaving school to go into treatment for cancer; the three boys make a plan to provide Mrs. Bixby with a day she will never forget. I wish Mr. Anderson had kept the language above board, and the boy humor toned down a little (or a lot). As it was, I loved the story but can’t really recommend it. If your tolerance for mild swearing and boogers and such is higher than mine, you should check it out.

Pax by Sara Pennypacker. (talking to each other animals) If you love foxes and nature and if you think people are the bad guys, spoiling the foxes’ natural habitat . . .

Ramie Nightingale by Kate diCamillo. (unbelievable supposedly realistic fiction?) If Ramie Clarke can just win the Little Miss Central Florida Tire competition, then her father, who left town two days ago with a dental hygienist, will see Raymie’s picture in the paper and (maybe) come home. Maybe it was my mood, but I found this one, by one of my favorite contemporary authors, entirely too precious, something I don’t often have a problem with. I’m all for kitsch and cuteness usually, but in this one the girls and the peripheral characters were just not believable.

The Seventh Wish by Kate Messner. (fantasy) This book about a ten year old girl and her drug-addicted older sister would be great bibliotherapy for middle graders with a family member who is drug abuser, but I’m not sure whether issue-driven fiction is appealing to the general reader or not. On the one hand drug abuse is rampant, and many kids might encounter it in themselves or in family members. On the other hand, well, the whole protecting kids while they are young and not scaring them about horrible stuff is a good thing, too. I’m also not sure what exactly the message is about magic/wishes/prayer. Pray and hope and wish, but don’t expect too much? Prayers and magical wishes are similar ways of coping, but be careful what you ask for?

The Great Shelby Holmes by Elizabeth Eulberg. Eleven year old John Watson moves to New York City, and his first (and only) friend is the great detective Shelby Holmes, who is a bit eccentric and difficult to understand, to say the least. Shelby, a nine year old wonder at solving mysteries, is definitely lacking in the area of people skills. Can she and John become friend and colleagues in spite of Shelby’s off-putting manner? Can they solve the mystery of the missing show dog—together? Good introduction to the Sherlock Holmes genre and to the idea of difficult personalities and grace extended for personal quirks.

Guile by Constance Cooper. (probably YA fantasy) “Sixteen-year-old orphan Yonie Watereye scrapes a living posing as someone who can sense the presence of guile (magic), though in fact she has no such power–it’s her talking cat, LaRue, who secretly performs the work.” (Goodreads) Creepy, but good, with themes that are probably a little too mature for middle grades.

The Worst Night Ever by Dave Barry. I love Dave Barry’s newspaper columns, but I’m not sure he has the best style for middle grade fiction. I meant to read the first book in this series, The Worst Class Trip Ever, but I never got around to it. In this one, which is about a kidnapped ferret and a ring of illegal rare animal importers, there’s a lot of repetition of jokes that aren’t very funny to start with: “My best friend Matt is an idiot”, repeated over and over. “It’s a komodo dragon, not a kimono dragon”, repeated at least three times by three different characters. Stupid dad. Crazy mom. That sort of thing. Maybe some kids would like the humor, but I was bored.

For the Glory by Duncan Hamilton

Sep15

For the Glory: Eric Liddell’s Journey from Olympic Champion to Modern Martyr by Duncan Hamilton.

Wow! Best nonfiction book I’ve read this year, maybe the best book I’ve read this year. Everyone knows about Eric Liddell, Olympic gold medalist, Chariots of Fire, missionary to China. At least, everyone thinks they know the story of his life. I even knew the basic outline, up to to and including his death during World War II in a Japanese internment camp in China.

Nevertheless, the legacy of this one man is hard to appreciate without reading something like Hamilton’s 350 page biography in which every single person interviewed or quoted has nothing but good to say of Eric Liddell, a truly selfless follower of Jesus Christ throughout a servant’s life and to a sacrificial and difficult death in Weihsien Internment Camp in February, 1945. I can only wish that I could leave such memories behind with those who knew me best under hard and trying circumstances, but unfortunately, my legacy, like that of most people, will be mixed at best.

I got the impression that Mr. Hamilton, while researching the life and death of Eric Liddell, tried to find something or some few things that would bring the man down to size and make this biography rather than hagiography. But it’s just not there. Did Liddell come across as preachy or arrogant? Never as far as the author can find. Did he stick to his principles in disregard of human need and frailty? No, he came to the decision that it would be best to allow the teenagers to play sports on Sunday afternoons in spite of Sabbath restrictions, and he even refereed the games so that no one would get hurt or get into fights. Did he hate or at least disdain the Japanese soldiers who first harassed him and his fellow missionaries and then imprisoned them under horrendous conditions? No, he submitted to their searches and seizures and injustices and cruelties and then encouraged his companions in camp to pray for the Japanese guards because “when we hate them we are self-centered.”

I am studying Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount from Matthew 5-7 with my Bible study group, and I was pleased and inspired to read that the Sermon on the Mount was Eric Liddell’s favorite part of the Bible, the blueprint for his Christian life. He read and re-read E. Stanley Jones’ book, The Christ of the Mount, and Liddell wrote his own commentary, influenced by his study of the Sermon on the Mount, entitled Discipleship, or The Disciplines of the Christian Life. I am inspired to read both the Jones book and Liddell’s meditations as I study Jesus’ instructions to his disciples in Matthew this fall.

In the meantime, I am inspired by the life and death of Eric Liddell. Yes, he stood fast for what he believed was right and refused to run in competitive races on Sunday. Yes, he won an Olympic gold medal in 1924 in Paris in spite of his principled stance. But so much more. He retired from running even though he could very likely have competed and won another gold medal in the 1928 Olympics in Amsterdam or even in the 1932 Olympics in Los Angeles. He felt he was called to China, and he was excited and pleased to be able to serve the Lord and the Chinese people.

When he went to China, he followed the instructions of his missionary sending organization, the London Missionary Society, even when those orders conflicted with his own desires. He spent long periods of time away from his beloved wife and children because the LMS wouldn’t let them go with Eric to his missionary post. In the midst of a war zone and later a Japanese-occupied zone, he continued to preach the gospel, minister to Chinese Christians, and help in any way he could, while submitting to the often capricious and vicious Japanese authorities as well as he was able.

In prison camp, Eric Liddell did his own work, then he helped others with their work. He got up an hour early, before the rest of the camp, to pray and read the Bible. He worked, often at menial tasks, without complaining. He mediated arguments, counseled the perplexed and depressed, and encouraged those who were losing hope under the starvation diet and brutal living conditions of the camp. He made himself available for every request, to every need, with every person who asked.

Eric Liddell’s close friend in camp, Joe Cotterill: “He was always so positive—even when there wasn’t much to be positive about and he carried the weight of others’ worries and burdens without hesitation.”

Another fellow prisoner: “He never let anyone see him downcast. Every day to him was still precious.He threw himself into it to make others feel better about the situation all of us were in.”

Another internee: “He was the man we turned to when personal relationships got just too impossible. He had a gentle, humorous way of . . . bringing to one’s mind some bygone happiness or the prospect of some future interest just round the corner.”

A child in camp: “I once saw him unloading supplies from the back of a cart. I said to myself: Why is he doing it? That’s someone else’s responsibility. Later I realized he did everything. It’s said he was worth ten men. I can believe it.”

Langdon Gilkey: “Liddell didn’t look like a famous athlete—or rather he didn’t look as if he thought of himself as one.” He was “surely the most modest man who ever breathed.” This was “one of the secrets of his amazing life.”

Eric Liddell: “The Christian life should be a life of growth. I believe the secret of growth is to develop the devotional life.”
“Every Christian should live a God-guided life. If you are not guided by God, you will be guided by something else. If in the quiet of your heart, you feel something should be done, stop and consider whether it is in line with the character and teaching of Jesus. If so, obey that impulse to do it, and in doing so you will find it was God guiding you.”

I am amazed and humbled by what God was able to do in and through the life of this one man.