By Melissa Albert
It’s a common misconception that children’s books are full of sunshine, rainbows, and cozy things happening with kind people. As Albert points out in his charmingly frightening adult debut, many books for youth are “brutal, stranger, more haunted by longing and loss” than those for adults. In Children (Tomorrow, 398 pages, $32)The production of those books is also a dark endeavor.
Ginny grew up in a Vermont farmhouse, raised (a term I use liberally here) by an actor and hugely successful children’s book author, whose fantasy series featured fictional versions of Ginny and her older brother, Ennis. When Ginny was 11, the house burned down, killing her parents and all the other adults. He and Ennis were the only survivors; He has not spoken to her – or their family – since.
As an adult, Ginny writes a memoir colored pink to promote her mother’s legacy. But when Ennis, an artist, appears to break his silence with a new performance (“Mother”), Ginny is forced to confront long-buried secrets from her past.
“The Children” is presented as a Gothic fantasy; I’d call it a Gothic thriller with a touch of magic that moves between the brother-sister’s childhood and Ennis’s show. While the chapters come to a close with “Mother” in the present, the scenes from Ginny’s past are mesmerizing, the farmhouse drawing everyone under its spell like any dwelling Shirley Jackson ever dreamed up. This book will make you question what you would give to create something truly amazing.
