Drawn Onward

‘She was gone.’ A simple – almost brutal – beginning to this fantasy account of bereavement, as the reader is presented with a lush world of trees, jungles, seas and islands, and on a sofa a man reading with a boy next to him, looking downcast. Or is this where the story starts? This is an intriguing book, written as a palindrome, so that the story can also start with the man reading, the boy asleep and the same words…

A young reader is almost certainly going to start at the conventional beginning, just after the title: ‘She was gone. And besides that, he no longer believed they would make it.’ For a first read-through, and for many read-throughs this may be enough: a heart-wrenching fantasy where a bereaved child  sets out on a quest and finds an answer. However, the older reader might be shown the alternative reading starting at the other end. ‘They would make it, And besides that, he no longer believed she was gone.’ What does he know when he returns? Why is he still sad? The text is not a strict palindrome, but a presentation of sections of text containing the same words, a language puzzle as well as an account of the complexity of bereavement.

Rich, vividly illustrated fantastic episodes, (suitable for readers above the age of 8) of the boy’s quest accompany his need to reconnect to his mother, with his key (palindromic) challenge, ‘Mom, were you glad you were Mom?’ at the heart of his encounter. This is a huge question, one that has many answers and, in the context of the loss of a parent, often, tragically, no answer from the one person the bereaved wants to talk with. Here the meeting with his mother (brought about by the liberation of her statue from a truly scary creature’s grip) brings healing and a sense of completion. Is the same story told if it is read the other way? Is the other way a retelling, the same story continuing?

The seriousness of the issue being discussed, the complexity of the story structure, and the ambiguity of the double narrative all make this a book not to be attempted lightly, but it is a stunning exploration of the fear and rage of grief as well as the possibility of peace and self-compassion.