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The Christmas Camera by Alta Halverson Seymour

Dec19

Another entry in the Christmas Around the World Series from Purple House Press, The Christmas Camera (originally Erik’s Christmas Camera) is the story of the twelve year old Swedish boy Erik Dahlquist and his cousin Bertil and the reclusive old fisherman Gunnar Eklund. It’s a gentle story, as is the rule with Ms. Halverson Seymour’s fiction. Bertil comes from the big city of Stockholm and is at first a bit haughty and inclined to look down on his country cousins. But all is well in the end. Gunnar Eklund is a somewhat secretive and scary character at first, but it soon becomes apparent that he is also good at heart.

The art of photography and Erik’s interest in it tie the story together much more than the actual plot does. And Erik’s pursuit of excellent and artistic photos gives the author an opportunity to work into the story a number of Swedish customs, celebrations, and folkways that make the book appealing in a different way. The children with their families celebrate Midsummer’s Eve, a bicycle trip, crayfish parties in August, St. Lucia Day, and finally Julafton (Christmas Eve). Anyone who wants to know more about traditional Swedish holidays and pastimes would enjoy reading about Erik and his photographic adventures.

The other books in the Christmas Around the World Series by Alta Halverson Seymour are:

And a few other books that fit a Christmas Around the World theme are:

The Boy Whaleman by George Fox Tucker

Nov8

In searching for children’s books published 100 years ago in 1924, I found a set of three books called The Three Owls, edited by New York Public Library children’s librarian Anne Carroll Moore. In these three volumes Ms. Moore collected various thoughts, essays, and booklists, written by herself and others, related to the children’s literature of her day. In the first volume of The Three Owls, a children’s author named Henry Beston (later to become husband to children’s author Elizabeth Coatsworth) reviews The Boy Whaleman, saying, “Of all the accounts of whaling voyages I have read for some time, quite the best is this boy’s book by George F. Tucker. It is the record of a youngster’s one cruise in an old-time whaler, which was rather a decent ship as whalers go.”

Mr. Beston and I are in agreement, not that I have read that many accounts of whaling voyages to compare. The book is more of a travelog than a story, although travel is not quite the word for the experience of a sailor who took ship on a whaler. More appropriate terms come to mind: hard work, danger, adventure, or “stink, grease, and backache” as the description of a whaleman’s work went at the time. The book takes place in the early 1860’s as the boy Homer Bleechly, age fifteen, takes ship from New Bedford, Massachusetts on the whaler, Seabird. He will be eighteen and a man by the time he returns to his home in New Bedford.

“My father, when a young man, went whaling for a single voyage which lasted for more than three years. He was a sailor, or, to use the regular phrase, a foremast hand, and at the end of two years, he became a boat-steerer or a harpooner. When I was a little boy he used to take me on his knee and tell me stories about the life of the whalemen, –of chasing whales and harpooning them, of angry whales smashing boats and chewing them to bits; of towing whales to the ship and cutting them in and trying them out; of losing the ship and remaining all might in the open boats; of encountering great storms and riding them out in safety; of meeting after many months another New Bedford vessel, and getting the latest news from home; and of visiting in the Pacific Ocean islands inhabited by savages.”

All these stories from Homer’s father are a foreshadowing of almost exactly what happens to Homer Bleechly on the Seabird, and Homer narrates his voyage with gusto and with much intelligent detail about the life of a whaleman. Some parents may cringe at the gory descriptions of slippery blood and guts covering the ship’s deck, of plunging a harpoon into the whale’s eye, or of scooping the spermaceti out of the whale’s head cavity. But a young person who is hungry for adventure can take these things in stride just as Homer apparently did. There are also mentions of the South Sea islanders as savages and uncivilized and of cannibalism both in the islands and in sailor stories that Homer and the others tell each other, but these things are not dwelt upon.

The work and culture of a whaling ship are the main focus of the book, and the story is somewhat slight in comparison to the details about the sea, the lore of whales, seamanship, financial matters in regard to whaling, and Homer’s shipmates in forecastle. It’s something of a coming of age story, but again the emphasis is not on Homer himself but rather on the Seabird and its job and the events of the voyage.

Reading this book made me want to read more about so many things: Tahiti, whales, Commodore Perry, whaling and seagoing, Captain Cook and his voyages, the Essex, the Bounty mutiny, Pitcairn Island, whale ships, missionaries to Polynesia and Micronesia, Magellan, the opening of Japan to Western influence, ambergris, and much more. I have a whole list of books to read next, but, alas, not enough time to read them all in addition to my many other reading projects.

The Pearl Lagoon by Charles Nordhoff

Nov2

What are boys (and girls) reading in the way of adventure stories these days? Most of the the realistic fiction I read these days for middle grade readers is “problem fiction”: mom is sinking into depression and the child must cope with the fallout, or the main character is autistic or has a learning disability, or the bad developers are going to turn the local park into a parking lot. Nothing wrong with that, but where’s the adventure? Many young readers are into fantasy fiction, which does have the adventure element, but it’s not usually an adventure that the reader can imagine participating in himself.

Well, the novels of yesteryear for young people were full of adventure. Sure some of the adventures required a suspension of disbelief, as does this 1924 novel, The Pearl Lagoon. Nevertheless, excitement and danger used to be abundant in fiction written for young people. In The Pearl Lagoon, Charlie Selden, the protagonist and narrator, is an all-American boy of sixteen, living on a California ranch, isolated and starved for adventure, when his Uncle Harry, “a buyer of copra and pearl-shell in the South Seas,” comes along with an offer that can’t be refused. Uncle Harry wants to take Charlie back to the island of Iriatai in the South Pacific, to help him hunt for pearls in Iriatai Lagoon.

Needless to say, Charlie jumps at the chance to go with Uncle Harry, and the adventure begins. The book includes fishing trips with Charlie’s new Tahitian friend, Marama, a boar hunt, a near-deadly shark attack, some rather perilous pearl diving, exploration of a hidden cave, and a climactic encounter with pirates who intend to steal all of the pearls the divers have found. Charlie grows older and wiser over the course of a life changing and thrilling experience.

The South Sea islander characters in the story are portrayed as “noble savages.” If the musical South Pacific and other stories of that nature are offensively “colonizing” to you, then Nordhoff’s 1924 vintage portrayal of the islands and their culture and people will be, too. Charlie says of his friend Marama,

“My friend could read and write, but otherwise he had no education in our sense of the word. He knew nothing of history, algebra, or geometry, but his mind was a storehouse of complex fishing-lore, picked up unconsciously since babyhood and enabling him to provide himself and his family with food. And when you come to think of it, that is one of the purposes of all education.”

The people of Tahiti and Iriatai are described variously as natives, savages, brown, formerly heathen, and superstitious. But they are also admired for their skill, courage, honesty, and loyalty. Charlie’s uncle, like the author Nordhoff, has come to think of Tahiti as his home, “the most beautiful thing in all the world.” You can read the book and decide for yourself whether Nordhoff shows love and respect for the Tahitian and other South Sea island peoples or not. I believe he does, and I recommend the book as a stirring romantic adventure, in the best sense of the word romance. (Romance, according to Sir Walter Scott, the great romantic novelist: “a fictitious narrative in prose or verse; the interest of which turns upon marvellous and uncommon incidents.”)

The Pearl Lagoon is marvelous, and uncommon, indeed.

The Black Pearl by Scott O’Dell

Oct21

I just finished reading The Black Pearl, a Newbery Honor book published in 1967. I’m trying to decide what I think. It takes place in Mexico, Baja California, and it’s very Catholic as would be appropriate for the setting. In the story, which is something of a fairy tale about a boy and the Monster Manta Diablo, the Madonna of the Sea is a direct representative of or substitute for God Himself, which bothers my Protestant brain. But it’s a good and well written fairy tale or folk tale about the dangers of pride and hubris and the mystery of God’s (or the Madonna’s?) will and working in the world.

The protagonist, Ramon Salazar, is sixteen years old and concerned about becoming a man. The coming of age theme is huge in this story. The Black Pearl, or the Pearl of Heavens as it is also named, is something of a MacGuffin, sought, found, given away, stolen, lost again, and replaced, all over the course of 140 pages of the book. The real story is about what’s going on inside Ramon, and his father, and Ramon’s enemy, Gaspar Ruiz the Sevillano. Ramon wants to go pearl diving, something his father has never allowed him to do, and he dreams of finding the largest and most valuable pearl of all, the Pearl of Heaven. (In fact, I think the book should have been called The Pearl of Heaven instead of The Black Pearl, but they didn’t ask me.) Diving for pearls is dangerous, however, and one of the most dangerous creatures in the sea is the manta, also known as a manta ray or devilfish.

We are told that the manta, especially The Manta Diablo, is a huge monster creature that has the power to swallow up an entire ship and that it is a “creature of beauty and of evil whom only two have seen with their eyes.” Ramon tells the reader in the beginning of the story that he is one of the two who have seen The Manta Diablo.

This book reminded me of Steinbeck’s The Pearl and of The Old Man and the Sea by Ernest Hemingway. But the similarities in setting and tone are superficial, I think. It’s been a long time since I read The Pearl. I don’t know exactly what I thin of this one. I sort of liked it. It’s about how the intent of the gift matters. A sacrifice or offering given out of spite and and in an attempt to buy God’s favor is wrong. But a gift given in adoration and gratitude is accepted. That part rings true. I wouldn’t suggest it for middle grade children, but older teens might enjoy puzzling out the meaning of this tale and engaging in the adventure.

All Thirteen by Christina Soontornvat

Oct10

All Thirteen: The Incredible Cave Rescue of the Thai Boys’ Soccer Team by Christian Soontornvat. A Robert F. Sibert Honor Book. An Orbis Pictus Honor Book. A Newbery Honor Book 2021.

“On the soccer fields of Mae San, Thailand, it sounds like a typical Saturday morning.”

In this 229 page somewhat over-sized book, Christina Soontornvat, an American writer with family in Thailand, tells the story of the 13 members of the Wild Boars soccer team who were trapped in the cave Tham Luang Nang Non, the Cave of the Sleeping Lady, for eighteen days while thousands of people came together from all over the world to effect their rescue. Soontornvat uses narrative, photographs, diagrams, and informational sidebar inserts to tell the story of the boys and how they survived and of the rescuers who worked to save them.

I already knew the outlines of the story of the cave rescue from watching the movie, Thirteen Lives. But reading about the cave rescue made me appreciate even more the miraculous nature of what was accomplished in rescuing these boys. Vern Unsworth, one of the many key players in the rescue, said, after the boys were safely out of the cave, “I still can’t believe it. It shouldn’t have worked. It just should not have worked.”

There is much information in the book about caves and cave exploration, about Thai culture and soccer and about Buddhism and Buddhist practice. Soontornvat is respectful and unbiased in her presentation, recognizing that there were cultural differences that hindered communication between the Thai rescuers and authorities and the outsiders, mostly, British and American, who came to help. These differences in communication style and in expertise were sometimes difficult to navigate, but also the differing approaches became strengths as the rescuers learned to work together.

All of this story is presented in narrative form and in language that is accessible to children ages eleven or twelve and up. As an adult reader, I was nevertheless fascinated and enlightened by this “children’s book.” The information boxes are thankfully kept to a minimum and contain interesting supplemental information about such subjects as hypothermia, Buddhism in Thailand, and specialized breathing equipment used by the rescuers. There are a few references to climate change (as a reason for heavy rainfall that trapped the boys in the cave) and evolution as an agent in the formation of limestone, but these are not obtrusive.

The story focuses mainly on the thirteen boys and their will to survive and it is compelling and well told. The book would be a fine supplement to studies of Southeast Asia, caves, diving and underwater rescues, Buddhism and world religions, or more specifically Thailand. Give it to kids who are interested in soccer, survival stories, or exploration stories. And I highly recommend both this book and the movie Thirteen Lives.

A Bit of Earth by Karina Riazi

Sep11

The Secret Garden, with a bit of Daphne du Maurier’s Rebecca, some neurodiversity, and Middle Eastern/Bengali culture thrown in—for middle grade readers. If that sounds like a strange mix, it is, but it works pretty well. The author is a “diversity advocate and an educator” with an “MFA in writing for children and young adults from Hamline University.” That resume doesn’t exactly appeal to my instincts for choosing a good story, but I was pleasantly surprised by how much I enjoyed the book.

There is one basic problem: the main character, Maria (pronounced MAH-ria, not ma-RI-a) is distinctly unsympathetic. Like Mary Lennox in The Secret Garden, Maria is an orphan with a bad attitude. Unlike Mary Lennox, Maria seems to have been born with, or at least believes she was born with, her grumpy, oppositional defiant personality, and she doesn’t so much change over the course of the story. Instead, Maria just persuades everyone else to accommodate her difficult and rude demeanor. She’s described as “grumpy”, “prickly”, “unpleasant” and many more such adjectives, and her words and actions certainly bear that description out.

And yet . . . I grew to rather like Maria. Maybe I’m a sucker. I’m not sure I could be as loving and forgiving and patient as the adults in the story are if I had a Maria to deal with in real life. But I wanted to be patient with this child who had lost her parents and been wounded by life in many ways. I wanted the secret garden in the story to redeem and renew first Maria, then Colin who is the second grumpy, unlikeable character in the story. And it does . . . to a certain extent.

All that to say, I had mixed feelings about A Bit of Earth. It’s an intriguing retelling of Frances Hodgson Burnett’s classic story, and Maria did worm her way into my heart despite her angry and sullen appearance (which is not reflected in the cover picture of a beautiful and pleasant-looking Maria). Nevertheless, I did want her to see that she could be more than just a grumpy old Oscar the Grouch, that she could let her guard down and be vulnerable and still survive and even thrive.

If you read A Bit of Earth, let me know what you think about the story and the characters. One mark of a good story is that it gives you ideas to think about. And this middle grade fiction story did indeed make me think.

Captain Cook Explores the South Seas by Armstrong Sperry

Sep9

Captain Cook Explores the South Seas by Armstrong Sperry. World Landmark #19.

The book’s title is a bit of a misnomer: James Cook didn’t explore just the South Seas. He went almost everywhere: starting in England, then Canada, the Arctic, the Antarctic, the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii), Tahiti, Cape Horn, the Cape of Good Hope, Alaska, Melanesia, Micronesia, New Zealand, Australia, and all points in between. He went on three voyages of exploration, and boy, did he explore. And he started out as a farmer’s son and ended up as captain of his own ship and leader of the three afore-mentioned expeditions, gaining fame and glory and all sorts of scientific information, maps, charts, botanic specimens, paintings, and other discoveries on behalf of the Royal Society and the British Admiralty.

All of the Landmark books that I have read are well written, but I think this one is one of the best in terms of excellent writing and storytelling. Cook’s adventurous life and rags to riches story lends itself to the creation of an adventure story, and Sperry’s telling of the story does not disappoint. He begins the tale as thirteen year old James Cook leaves his home to take up an apprenticeship that will bring him near the sea:

“That August morning in the year 1741, the early sun was as bright as a promise of good fortune. It cast a light of gold over the rolling moors of Yorkshire, on fat sheep grazing in the fields. It lay warm as a blessing on the shoulders of the boy who followed so eagerly an empty road that stretched forever away from Great Ayton.

Mark that boy well, Reader! For young James Cook–tall for his thirteen summers, and with all his belongings swinging in a bundle at the end of a stick–had set forth on a great adventure. Although in years to come he was to travel farther over the earth’s surface than any man before him, perhaps this first youthful journey was the most momentous of all. It set the pattern of his future.”

Armstrong Sperry, author of the Newbery award story, Call It Courage, traveled in the South Seas himself, and learned both French and Tahitian. Sperry was also a Navy veteran and interested in all things nautical, and he was a talented artist whose illustrations for this book about Captain Cook are exquisite and fully supportive of the lively narrative text. Sperry wrote two other books for the Landmark series, The Voyages of Christopher Columbus and John Paul Jones, Fighting Sailor as well as several other nautical-themed fiction books for children. I am eager to read some of his other books since the writing in this one is so very good.

A couple of content considerations: Sperry describes the “savages”, both of North America (Canada) and of the Pacific islands, in mostly unflattering terms. Cook described the islanders in particular as primitive, thieving, and unhygienic, reserving the term “handsome” for the Tahitians and the Hawaiians only. So that’s how Sperry describes them. And the life and travels of Captain James Cook do not end well. He gets into a dispute, perhaps a misunderstanding, with the king and people of the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii), and he is killed on the beach by a Hawaiian war club wielded by one of the king’s warriors.

Despite the content considerations, I highly recommend Captain Cook Explores the South Seas, maybe along with a book told more from the perspective of the native islanders. The Last Princess, The Story of Princess Ka’iulani of Hawaii by Fay Stanley is one possibility. Another Landmark about Hawaii (which I haven’t read) is Hawaii, Gem of the Pacific by Oscar Lewis.

The Voyages of Henry Hudson by Eugene Rachlis

Aug16

The Voyages of Henry Hudson, World Landmark #54, is all about the quest “to discover a passage by the North Pole to Japan and China.” The first attempts to find a way to Asia via the North Pole were not directed at finding the Northwest Passage but rather a number of dangerous and ultimately fruitless journeys north up the coast of Greenland and then east to find a way north of Norway and Russia to get to China and Japan. Hudson’s first two voyages were unsuccessful as he was following this route.

But Henry Hudson, encouraged by the stories of his friend Captain John Smith, thought that the passage to the East lay to the west in the New World. So in his third and fourth voyages, Hudson wanted to go west, but most people still thought that he should try going east again—or that the whole idea of a passage to the to Asia in the northern seas was hopeless. And so it was. The fourth and last voyage was a total failure: the ship was trapped in the ice, food ran low, the crew mutinied, and Hudson was abandoned in the ship’s boat in icy waters never to be heard from again.

So why is Hudson remembered, and why are a major river and and a bay named for him? Well, he didn’t discover the Northwest Passage because there is no Northwest Passage, but he did pave the way for Europeans, Dutch, French, Swedish, and English, to map the New World and to begin to settle it and eventually build two nations, Canada and the United States.

Henry Hudson was one of the earliest ship’s captains to keep a meticulous ship’s log. There’s a note on sources in the back of this Landmark book, and author Eugene Rachlis tells readers:

“All the known documents pertaining to Hudson are available. Some are scarce and can be found only in the reference rooms of major libraries. Others, or at least parts of them, are more readily obtainable. Those in Dutch and Latin have been translated into English. The Hudson documents are the major sources for the facts in this book, along with a dozen or so other books which provided material on the items in which Hudson lived, the places he visited and the people he saw.”

For those who are studying Canada and Canadian history, this book, along with World Landmark #8, Royal Canadian Mounted Police by Richard Neuberger and #24 The Hudson’s Bay Company by Richard Morenus would provide a good introduction to the Canadian story. Other Landmarks that impinge upon Canadian history are Evangeline and the Acadians by Robert Tallant, Rogers’ Rangers and the French and Indian War by Bradford Smith, General Brock and Niagara Falls by Samuel Hopkins Adams, and The Alaska Gold Rush by May McNeer.

The Hudson’s Bay Company by Richard Morenus

Aug14

This Landmark history book is really about the French voyageurs and the men of the Hudson’s Bay Company: Pierre Radisson, Medart Chouart des Groseilliers, Le Moyne d’Iberville, Henry Kelsey, Alexander MacKenzie, James Knight, Louis Riel.. And it’s about the fur trade and the ongoing centuries-long dispute between the French, the British, and the Native Americans over who would control that fur trade and reap the riches to be gained from it.

The focus of the book is Canadian history, although events do dip down south of the Canadian American border from time to time. This spotlight on Canada only makes sense since The Hudson’s Boy Company is World Landmark #24, not American. The story features a lot of fightin’ and cheatin’ and thievin’ between 1649 when the book opens and the first half of the twentieth century when it ends. Mr. Morenus chronicles all the ups and downs of the the fur trade and the men who were engaged in it, and he uses language that was appropriate for 1956 when the book was published but may sound jarring to twenty-first century ears (words such as Indian, half-breed, Eskimo, savages).

No one, except for the Royal Canadian Mounties who “brought law to the West and kept it”, is a complete hero in this story. The voyageurs are hardworking, brave, skilled, thieves, poachers, and cutthroats. The Native Americans (in Canada nowadays the correct term is First Nations peoples) are cunning, sometimes friendly, sometimes violent, victimized and drugged with alcohol by the white men. The British and French military and governing authorities are mostly greedy, power hungry, and willing to do almost anything to maintain control of the fur trade. Maybe the fifth Earl of Selkirk who brought a large number of Scots to colonize various parts of Canada, could be considered a “good guy”, but he didn’t have a happy ending. And Alexander MacKenzie seems to have been an intrepid explorer. But the rest of these guys are not anyone you would want to meet in a dark alley.

Anyway, the Hudson’s Bay Company ruled a great portion of Canada for many years. In fact, Hudson’s Bay Company was thought by some to be more powerful and certainly richer than the British government of Canada itself. Now they are a department store conglomerate, also in the real estate and investments business. Their history is integral to the history of Canada and of the northern United States.

Read more about Canada and Canadian history:

  • The Royal Canadian Mounted Police, a World Landmark book by Richard Neuberger, tells more about the Mounties who brought law and order to Rupert’s Land, the territory of the Hudson’s Bay Company.
  • The Canadian Story by May McNeer gives a brief introduction to the sweep of Canadian history, with short chapters for elementary age children.
  • Alexander MacKenzie: Canadian Explorer by Ronald Syme tells of the explorer who made the first journey across Canada to the Pacific coast.
  • The Real Book about Canada by Lyn Harrington is another accessible history/geography narrative about the Canadian story.

All Aboard for Freedom! by Marie McSwigan

Aug11

The author of this book, Marie McSwigan, also wrote the popular World War 2 story, Snow Treasure, which is based on a true story of children outwitting the Nazis to rescue the country’s gold reserves. All Aboard for Freedom! is also based on a true story of a group of children outwitting oppressive authorities, this time in Czechoslovakia in 1951. And the oppressors are not Nazis but rather their own countrymen who have bought into the Communist regime aided by the Russians.

Ludmila Novak is foster mother to five children, orphaned by the war. The oldest, age thirteen, is Franta Kristufek. When the Communist authorities threaten to separate the children and their beloved foster mother from each other and send the children to state run institutions, Fran comes up with a plan to keep them all together. However, the plan involves a train, the help of adults, and a very dangerous, time-critical strategy for escape. Who can Fran trust to help him escape Czechoslovakia to freedom in Germany? How can he keep his plan a secret with four other children involved, the youngest only four years old? What if “they” (the Communists) come for the children before they can put their plan into action?

This book, published in 1954, is very 1950’s, very anti-communist and pro-American, and very exciting. The children, especially Fran, are believable but also intrepid and imaginative. The story reminds me of one of Helen MacInnes’ Cold War spy novels, but it’s written for children, not adults. And it pictures characters, a time, and a situation that we in the West are in danger of forgetting—the people of Czechoslovakia who suffered under communist rule and yearned for the freedom we now take for granted. One more plus to this book: Fran stops to pray for God’s guidance and protection several times during the story. And that resort to prayer seems quite believable and wise, too.

All Aboard for Freedom is a book for train lovers, patriots, and adventurers. Pair it with Snow Treasure for a double dose of good reading.