Into the Woods

The Pied Piper returns in a story which is part fairy tale (a number of other fairy tale characters and stories are embedded), part comedy caper and substantially high drama. Imagine, if you can, a mixing of the Ahlbergs, Dahl, Aiken and Pullman and you have many of the special flavours here, and what holds it together is the aptly named Storm, a wonderfully wild, strong-willed and battling hero, who stubbornly resists the evil Dr DeWilde and his wolves. It turns out that she has the magic pipe too and is an unwitting target of DeWilde’s scheming. Without giving too much away, he rids the town of the rats, steals the children (fattened at the Ginger House Orphanage for the lost by Bee Bumble) and takes them into the mountains. Storm is the only one who seems able to do anything: her feeble parents (Zella, rescued from her tower by Capt Reggie Eden) have passed over responsibility for doing anything to Storm’s elder sister Aurora, who loves domesticity, and then they pass over responsibility for the baby too, before Zella passes on herself. The baby, ‘Oh, call her anything,’ is called exactly that. Storm becomes protector for her two sisters and through many desperate adventures and a thrilling climax, and with her fireworks (echoes of Pullman’s Lyra), the pipe and much courage, you can guess that she battles through. There are so many scenes that live on as sharp episodes in the memory, connected by the energetic narrative drive and invention. This is exuberant and magical storytelling which takes on a further life when it’s read aloud.