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David Almond
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From: Melanie C. Duncan <duncanm>
Date: Wed, 05 Jul 2000 20:10:52 -0500
I loved it! It works on so many levels. Here's the review I wrote for The Bookdragon Review about it:
Almond, David. Skellig. 1999. Delacorte Press, ISBN 038532653X.
[Children 9].
Melanie C. Duncan, reviewer TBR March 15, 2000
"I found him in the garage?He was lying there in the darkness behind the tea chests, in the dust and dirt. It was as if he'd been there forever. He was filthy and pale and dried out and I thought he was dead. I couldn't have been more wrong." ---Michael
Michael's world is falling apart. His family has moved to a new house on Falconer Road, his baby sister is dying, and he sees things in the dust and darkness of the rickety garage on the property. Things like dead bluebottle flies, spider webs, and a body. A closer examination shows the body is propped up against a wall in the shadows, and when Michael starts to touch it, the body speaks. "Twenty-seven and fifty-three." After his initial fright, Michael begins to question the cadaverous-looking man? Creature? A victim of Arthur Itis (arthritis), Skellig's joints are almost completely locked into place and he has strange, wing-like lumps on his shoulders underneath his jacket. As Michael buries his worries about his sister in caring for Skellig, he gradually opens up to the new world around him and to new friends like Mina, a girl who lives down the street. The poetry inherent in Almond's prose, the multi-layered story, and the sense that Skellig is whatever he is needed to be confirm this book's choice as the Whitbread Award's 1998 Children's Book of the Year. Adults and children will lose themselves in the wonder that is Skellig.
Blessings, Melanie C. Duncan, M.S.L.S. Reference Librarian Washington Memorial Library
The Bookdragon Review (ISSN 152757) http://www.bookdragonreview.com
Received on Wed 05 Jul 2000 08:10:52 PM CDT
Date: Wed, 05 Jul 2000 20:10:52 -0500
I loved it! It works on so many levels. Here's the review I wrote for The Bookdragon Review about it:
Almond, David. Skellig. 1999. Delacorte Press, ISBN 038532653X.
[Children 9].
Melanie C. Duncan, reviewer TBR March 15, 2000
"I found him in the garage?He was lying there in the darkness behind the tea chests, in the dust and dirt. It was as if he'd been there forever. He was filthy and pale and dried out and I thought he was dead. I couldn't have been more wrong." ---Michael
Michael's world is falling apart. His family has moved to a new house on Falconer Road, his baby sister is dying, and he sees things in the dust and darkness of the rickety garage on the property. Things like dead bluebottle flies, spider webs, and a body. A closer examination shows the body is propped up against a wall in the shadows, and when Michael starts to touch it, the body speaks. "Twenty-seven and fifty-three." After his initial fright, Michael begins to question the cadaverous-looking man? Creature? A victim of Arthur Itis (arthritis), Skellig's joints are almost completely locked into place and he has strange, wing-like lumps on his shoulders underneath his jacket. As Michael buries his worries about his sister in caring for Skellig, he gradually opens up to the new world around him and to new friends like Mina, a girl who lives down the street. The poetry inherent in Almond's prose, the multi-layered story, and the sense that Skellig is whatever he is needed to be confirm this book's choice as the Whitbread Award's 1998 Children's Book of the Year. Adults and children will lose themselves in the wonder that is Skellig.
Blessings, Melanie C. Duncan, M.S.L.S. Reference Librarian Washington Memorial Library
The Bookdragon Review (ISSN 152757) http://www.bookdragonreview.com
Received on Wed 05 Jul 2000 08:10:52 PM CDT
