The Ask and the Answer By Patrick NessWalker, 519pp. £12.99 Fever Crumb By Philip ReeveScholastic, 400pp. £12.99 Season of Secrets By Sally NichollsMarion Lloyd Books, 254pp. £6.99
With over six months of 2009 still ahead, it may seem premature to start thinking in terms of the best books of the year, children’s or otherwise. Where the former are concerned, however, it is unlikely there are many titles to come which will make as strong an impression as the three reviewed here: all are masterly exercises in the art of storytelling, the products of powerful imaginations and engaged with themes to which a young readership should easily relate.
Published in 2008, Patrick Ness's debut young adult title, The Knife of Never Letting Go, was one of that year's most widely acclaimed novels, introducing its readers to the dystopian domain of the planet known as New World and to Todd and Viola, the teenagers whose experiences there lie at the heart of the story. Now comes Ness's sequel, The Ask and the Answer, in which we witness the young people's continuing struggle to survive the very considerable pains of separation and loss and to contend with the often extremely cruel circumstances of their treatment by the vindictive and sadistic. These are qualities most markedly embodied in the characters of the self-styled President Prentiss and his son Davy, neither of whom lacks any ingenuity in exhibiting their fondness for manipulation and torture, physical or psychological.
The “New World” created by Ness is remarkably inventive in its details, of which the most immediately striking is the concept of what is known as “The Noise”. This device permits the planet’s males to “hear” the thoughts of those around them and is the mechanism by which significant themes of the novel begin to parallel many of the disturbing aspects of our own contemporary, noise-polluted era. But it also provides, in terms of the novel’s structure and plotting, a fascinating backdrop for Ness’s exploration of matters of gender, loyalty and deceit. It is in the delineation of the relationship between Todd and Viola that these thematic concerns are given an expression which maintains the reader’s attention throughout.
While Philip Reeve's Fever Crumbis also set in a futuristic "New World" it is in a location at once much more recognisable than Ness's. Specifically, this is a London of many centuries ahead, but one where echoes of yesterday's past and today's present are all around, often very wittily and mischievously depicted as in-jokes. Sedan chairs ply their trade across the streets with a speed and ease compared with which Hollywood car chases seem very tame indeed; religious processions are heard "chanting the name of some old-world prophet, 'Hari, Hari! Hari Potter!'"; once-familiar place names have become transformed into "Ox-Fart Circus", "Pimlicker" and "Chel's See"; oaths are taken in the name of "Cheesers Crice!", described as "some obscure cockney god". All of this is done in a style which blends a Dickensian sense of the grotesque with the atmosphere of film noir.
“Down these mean streets a man must go,” as one of the characters remarks early on.
It is in the midst of these “mean streets” (and sometimes in the labyrinths beneath them) that much of the novel’s narrative takes place as we follow the growth of the strange-looking 14-year-old girl whose name gives the book its title.
In essence, this is a “foundling” story in which Fever, an apprentice engineer, has to face up to a disturbing sequence of revelations about her origins and, simultaneously, to play a central role in unlocking – literally and figuratively – the secret which may save a city under the threat of imminent siege.
Post-apocalyptic fiction does not come much more entertaining than this and fans of Reeve’s much praised Mortal Engines quartet will respond enthusiastically to this “prequel”.
Sally Nicholls's Season of Secrets has the unenviable task of living up to the excellence of her debut novel from last year, Ways To Live Forever; it is a challenge more than adequately met. The mother of Molly and Hannah, two pre-teenage children, has recently died and they have been sent to live with their grandparents, while their father takes time out "to get things Sorted Out".
Narrated in the first-person voice of the younger child, Molly, the story moves from its realistic opening to a beautifully realised and totally convincing mythic dimension when she encounters a strange “man” in the nearby woods.
Her evolving dealings with him take place against a background of poetic seasonal change, the overall result being a poignant novel exploring the complexities of childhood grief, its many manifestations and its healing.
Robert Dunbar is a commentator on children’s books and reading.
Patrick Ness will be speaking on May 16th at this year’s Children’s Books Ireland Conference, details from 01-8727475