Lowly’s Book Blog

I can’t believe it. I have adored Pulman’s Janna Mysteries from the moment I opened book 1, and Random House was giving away book 4 FOR FREE!! Thank you, thank you. And even better, I had a long train ride home that night.

Anyway, about the book. For those of you who have been reading the Janna mysteries much of this will be old news, but for the rest of the world I will try to catch you up. Janna is a teenager who has been raised by her single mum. So what? Well, the story is set in 12th century England, a time when single mums were not so common. Janna’s mother was the village midwife and herbalist and used her skills to support the two of them. Eventually however a new priest came to the parish and condemned Janna’s mother as a witch.

Now Janna is alone. She has learned some of her mother’s skills, but certainly not all. And over the previous three books Janna has been adding to her knowledge and investigating her mother’s death and her own parentage.

In book 4, Janna is far more confident of her skills and she has obtained some hard evidence about her mother’s early life. She decides to visit the abbey where her mother was a novice and see if anyone there can help her. Along the way she travels with a troupe of entertainers for safety. Strangely a dashing young nobleman joins the troup, apparently attracted by Janna. And then the murders start.

Pulman admits that she was inspired to write these books by the Cadfael series written by Ellis Peters. I remember one delightful summer when I managed to read all 20 of that series. The Janna Mysteries are not really a ripoff, more an homage designed to lead younger readers into Medieval history. But as a Cadfael reader, I was well familiar with the Civil War between Stephen and Matilda. In this book, that dispute becomes very important.

OK, four down. All wonderful. When can I get my hands on book 5. Janna is awfully close to finding her father, and I can’t wait.

Does it sound awful if I said I had read this before? OK maybe not these words in this order, but I am sure I have read it many times before.

David McRobbie has been writing books for young adults longer than I have been working in libraries. His first Wayne series was ‘old’ in the 90s, and now suddenly Wayne Wilson is back.

The book is actually a collection of anecdotes about young Wayne Wilson’s daily life. No detail is too small or insignificant to be included. It is generally funny, warm and a very light read.

But my question is why? There are literally hundreds of this kind of book being written by very mediocre writers and published every year.

Is McRobbie trying to tie into the Boys and Reading trend? Well perhaps 10 or 12 stories about Wayne would have done. None of my reluctant readers would be seen opening a 400 page book. It simply is not in the image. Someone might think you were a nerd.

But then maybe there were some bills that needed paying, and revisiting an old friend in an old formula is a great way to publish quickly. Sorry McRobbie, but I have read much of your work that was far better.

Ahh, now I have finished a book that is truly a work of speculative fiction. This term has been recently as more acceptable than scifi. But mostly I classify books as either scifi or fantasy. This book doesn’t fit either place.

To my mind speculative fiction asks ‘what if?’ In this case the question is ‘What if Gulliver’s Travels was true?’ Based on what we now know about 18th Century Europe, the answer has to be that the European empires would immediately travel to Liliputia and its neighbors, claim the land and resources and enslave the inhabitants. Add 120 years and then Adam Roberts arrives on the scene to describe the results. The English have enslaved the Liliputians and their like to work in factories, creading products of incredible finesse and delicate design. The French on the other hand are ‘allied’ with the giants which they find to be exceptional war machines. Naturally, France and England are at war, aren’t they always?

Abraham Bates is a young crusader for the rights of the Lilliputians. The opening section very nicely characterises him as a young man on a hopeless quest to free the little people from enslavement. The second section of the book introduces our heroine, Eleanor. She is from an impoverished gentle family and forced to marry a wealthy factory owner. Her chapters very nicely remind the reader of what life was like for a upper class women of the mid 19th century.

Both Abraham and Eleanor get caught up in the war. France has invaded England, taken London and are moving north to York to take posession of a super cannon invented by Eleanor’s father. Abraham, Eleanor and her fiance the Dean of York are travelling north as friends of the French when the Lilliputians begin a battle for freedom. And very effective fighters they are too.

This book is another that can be read on meny levels. On the surface it is an adventure. But so was Gulliver’s Travels. We all know that Swift was an extraordinary satirist and nothing on the page meant exactly what it said. I would dearly love to read this book again after refreshing my memory by Gulliver again. I suspect this book is a very effective sequel.