I’ve been working on Glister for a while now and it’s turned out to be an all-ages book. I didn’t make it into one, try and force it into a shape it didn’t want to take, that’s the way it wanted to be so I went with it. The All-ages label is a bit of an odd duck. What does it mean? Go into a book shop and you won’t find an all-ages section, at least not in any shop I’ve been to.
All-ages is one of those terms that is allowed to survive in comics, because, for all the faults of the US/UK Direct Market, it’s an industry hasn’t been marketed to within an inch of it’s life. In the children’s section of any bookshop you’ll find the books chopped up into different sections, picture books, early readers, 8-12, Young Adult. Then the adult books are shelved alphabetically for fiction, then sliced by genre. All-ages books are the odd ducks, the ones that belong everywhere, can sit comfortably in the 8-12, and on the adult fiction. I suppose I see the all-ages book as a kind of underdog, something of the unclassifiable breed in the Crufts of the book world. I thought I’d share one of fave all-ages books with you, and hope you’ll suggest some of yours back to me.
Travel Light by Naomi Mitchison. Naomi Mitchison led a long (she lived to be 101) and fascinating life. She wrote more than seventy books including works of fiction, non-fiction, auto-bio, sci-fi, and historical. There’s something of that restless desire not to be pinned down redolent in Travel Light. It’s the story of Halla, who’s thrown out of her Royal family in a fairy-tale fashion. She lives with bears and dragons, makes and loses friends, talks with the animals, grows up and comes full circle, to a kind of self-acceptance at the end. That summing up doesn’t do the book any justice, it’s beautifully written, “She had begun to breathe again, to know that at least she had not melted away like a reflection from the surface of the water.” with so many lovely touches. Halla is our hero, she acts heroically, yet distrusts heroes. They are often unpredictable, violent brutes. Steinvor the Valkyrie, is an opportunistic vulture, rubbing her hands enthusiastically at the prospect of battle, so she can sweep down and pick up a hero, blood still spurting from his veins. Halla moves from her fairy-tale world and comfort with her dragon family to the world of men, corruption, hypocrisy, greed, and, cruelty. She helps wherever she can. Time travels light for her too, generations pass on her journey.
That’s one of the reasons, for me, it’s an all-ages book, appealing to the young and old. I recognise Halla’s feeling of time passing so quickly that it’s like it’s playing tricks on her. I’m looking down the wrong end of my 30s and the right end sure zipped by quickly. Halla’s disgusted by the corruption of the world, yet navigates it the best she can. By not wanting to be a hero she becomes the hero, living life the best way she sees fit. So, it’s a wise book, but not a worthy book, it travels light over the serious aspects and still has plenty of fun along the way. I loved it and when my daughter’s a little bit older I think she’ll enjoy it too. That’s the joy of an all-ages book. It’s one we can share.
Travel Light is a Peadpod Classic and has a cover by Kevin Huizenga (another reason to own this book).
Go to www.peapodclassics.com or wwwsmallbeerpress.com
The cover price is $12
ISBN 1-931520-14-3
Thanks to Kelly Link and Gavin Grant for bringing this book back to print
