36. Alan Garner Discussion

[Philip Overby]

Been a while since I posted one of these (I'm trying to keep up with all the reading I'm doing!). Number 36 is Alan Garner. I don't read much children's lit, so I can't comment on his work. I guess I wasn't much of a reader as a child. Mostly Greek Mythology picture books and Wizards, Warriors, and You (if you know this, you're awesome). Garner doesn't view himself as children's lit writer, but his stories seem to be identified as such. He's written several novels and short story collections and has won awards for them such as the Carnegie Medal.

Anyone ever read Alan Garner?

 

[Feo Takahari]

I read Elidor. It was a children's fantasy story like any other, distinguished only by its seriousness--there was no comic relief like you'd find in Bruce Coville's books, and the children's struggle was treated as a dangerous conflict with world-changing consequences. Then again, it was written in 1965, so it was probably ripped off on every possible level by the fantasists to come.