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Books: The Changeover
Jan. 14th, 2012 08:32 amMargaret Mahy is one of those authors I inexplicably missed while growing up. As a kid I was suspicious of authors who wrote both realistic and fantastic fiction. Or it could have been that I saw her name on a lot of picture books and so avoided her chapter books. I'm not sure. I'm confused as to the pub date of the Changeover because the internet keeps saying 1984, but my paperback copy says 1974 for copyright, which I find more plausible somehow given the tone. Maybe it was written a full decade before it was published, maybe my ppb has a typo.
I would never have read this if someone online hadn't been talking about it, because, oh, the cover, ouch ouch ouch.
I think, though, that this may be the most observantly, deliciously written young adult novel I've read in maybe a decade. It's emotionally, morally, and linguistically delightful - full of complex turns in the emotional and moral bits.
I love how the teenage characters have lives that are enmeshed in (affecting and being affected by) both adults and children. I love how the conversations about sex and sexuality seem... plausible? honest? without being a focus of every scene. Also the areas where as a teenager you have clear perception and the other areas where you're just going to take it on faith and leap over seem perfectly drawn to me. Very precisely used language mediating raw honesty. It might be a good read for folks who like Nina Kiriki Hoffman?
The plot is,y'know, a plot. Serviceable. They way they move through and around the plot is great. Mmm, let me amend: the part of the plot where they're fighting the bad thing is sort of serviceable. They way they weave that plot into the secondary motivations of main characters and all sorts of main motivations of secondary characters pleases me quite a bit.
I would never have read this if someone online hadn't been talking about it, because, oh, the cover, ouch ouch ouch.
I think, though, that this may be the most observantly, deliciously written young adult novel I've read in maybe a decade. It's emotionally, morally, and linguistically delightful - full of complex turns in the emotional and moral bits.
I love how the teenage characters have lives that are enmeshed in (affecting and being affected by) both adults and children. I love how the conversations about sex and sexuality seem... plausible? honest? without being a focus of every scene. Also the areas where as a teenager you have clear perception and the other areas where you're just going to take it on faith and leap over seem perfectly drawn to me. Very precisely used language mediating raw honesty. It might be a good read for folks who like Nina Kiriki Hoffman?
The plot is,y'know, a plot. Serviceable. They way they move through and around the plot is great. Mmm, let me amend: the part of the plot where they're fighting the bad thing is sort of serviceable. They way they weave that plot into the secondary motivations of main characters and all sorts of main motivations of secondary characters pleases me quite a bit.
