Daughter of the Sea
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Cover Story
The cover of this issue is a design incorporating illustrations from four books illustrated by the subject of our Authorgraph, Ian Beck. The top left illustration is from Five Little Ducks (Orchard), the top right from Poppy and Pip's Picnic (to be published Autumn '97 by HarperCollins), the bottom left from The Owl and the Pussy-cat (Transworld) and the bottom right from Home Before Dark (to be published September '97 by Scholastic). Ian Beck's Picture Book (Hippo) is reviewed in this issue.
Beck talks to BfK's interviewer, Julia Eccleshare, also in this issue. His distinctive decorative style with its sensitive pen line and cross hatching has a nostalgic but sometimes also a surreal quality - he describes it as 'a look that is floating, strong and wistful all at the same time'.
Thanks to Orchard, HarperCollins, Transworld and Scholastic for their help in producing this composite cover.
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Daughter of the Sea
A spare and elegant re-working of a number of Icelandic, Scottish and Irish tales framed within the story of the baby girl, Gioga, found in the water one stormy night by the fisherman Munroe. He and Jannet are middle-aged and childless and willingly take on the child as a gift from the sea. Only the strange old woman Eilean o da Freya seems intent on spoiling their joy. Even though I am no great fan of myths and legends I was swept along by the power of the writing and there was sufficient detail of the daily hard grind of the fishing community for me, realist that I am, to feel that I had one foot firmly on the ground while the rest of me was caught up in the story. It moves inexorably to a wholly fulfilling conclusion as the teenage Gioga recovers the silvery seal-skin blanket in which she was found, puts it on and returns to her own people-the seals.
