Swine Lake
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Cover Story
This issue’s cover illustration by Fangorn is taken from Brian Jacques’ Lord Brocktree (Hutchinson, 0 09 176877 2, £12.99), the thirteenth title in the internationally best-selling Redwall series. Salamandastron, the ancestral home of the Badger Lords, is under threat from Ungatt Trunn, an enemy whose power would seem to be absolute and whose evil knows no bounds. The only hope for survival is the badger Lord Brocktree who is drawn to the fortress by an undeniable sense of destiny. Brian Jacques' masterful storytelling as always spins a web of high adventure that will enthral the reader from the first page to the last. Thanks to Hutchinson Children’s Books for their help in producing this September cover.
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Swine Lake
Illustrated by Maurice Sendak
Any picture book illustrated by Sendak is likely to be an event. His pictures for a tale by the late James Marshall are busy, exuberant and crowded with detail and character. However, Marshall's urbane story, of a down-at-heel wolf who becomes a ballet-lover, proceeds at a leisurely pace. I think you would have to be at least 5 or 6 years old to appreciate how an initial interest in eating pigs could turn to the satisfaction of making an unintentional but critically acclaimed entrance on the stage with the Boarshoi Ballet at the New Hamsterdam Theater. You will need to be much older to notice all of Sendak's visual references, and to appreciate his awful puns, and to realise what a strange conglomeration of fairy tales Marshall has put into the plot of the ballet Swine Lake. All in all, the child audience for this homage from one great American picture-book creator to another may be limited, but every page is a joy to look at.
