FernFolio » mental illness

A Perfect Gentle Knight by Kit Pearson

fernfolio — Sat, 29 Nov 2008 01:05:17 +0000

Since their mother’s death, three years before, eleven year-old Corrie and her five brothers and sisters have had only one another to hold onto. Lost in his classes and his research and his book, their professor father seems largely oblivious to them, the sad state of the house and garden, and the terrible meals the housekeeper leaves for them.
And so it is that fifteen year-old Sebastian has become the head of the household, responsible for his younger siblings. It is he who keeps a gentle rein on the rather wild six year-old twins, Orly and Juliet, draws up schedules for meal preparation and dish washing, decides bedtimes, and doles out allowances. It is Sebastian, as Sir Lancelot, who has created the knights of the Round Table and who, in the absence of King Arthur, their father, presides over their meetings, reads to them from the old legends, and taught them the Code of Chivalry.
Though, at fourteen, Roz seems to be chafing at Sebastian’s rule, Corrie, Harry, and the twins are eager participants in the knightly gatherings, and long for the day when they will undergo their trials before being dubbed knights by Sir Lancelot. As Sir Lancelot’s squire, Corrie – Master Cor – enjoys a close relationship with Sebastian, and fiercely defends him against any who might scoff at his preoccupation with knights and heraldry, or laugh at his shoulder-length hair.
At home, he is the perfect gentle knight, looked up to by his brothers and sisters, but Sebastian’s life at school is miserable. A target of the class bullies, he is friendless and the victim of constant verbal and physical assaults. Though Corrie worries about her brother, and longs to find the courage to tell her father about her concerns, Sebastian tells her that everything is fine, and that she is not to trouble Fa.
After three years without any close friends of her own, Corrie finds herself drawn to Meredith, whose cheerful determination to become friends breaks down the walls that Corrie has put up around herself. Meredith is bright and perceptive, curious about the Bell siblings, and the game they seem to play together. When she finally worms the story of the Round Table out of Corrie, Meredith wants to play, too, and Corrie struggles to nurture their growing friendship while remaining faithful to Sir Lancelot.
When Roz becomes wrapped up in clubs and her friends, and Sebastian suddenly grows remote, Corrie must shoulder responsibility for her younger siblings, while watching anxiously as her family spirals out of control.
Set in the late 1950s in Vancouver, Kit Pearson’s A Perfect Gentle Knight is a compelling story about grief and loyalty. Quite simply, a beautiful tale!
FernFolio Editor

Tom Finder by Martine Leavitt

fernfolio — Sat, 12 Jan 2008 01:23:35 +0000

The first thing Tom remembers is walking, his back and backside screaming in pain. He has forgotten everything that came before, family, friends, school, his last name. In his backpack he finds a notebook with notes about Mozart and a candy heart imprinted with the words You are nice, so he concludes that he is nice, and when he finds a big native man standing at the river’s edge praying and weeping, he asks if he can help. The native man, Samuel Wolflegs, is looking for his son, Daniel, a drug addict, who is living on the streets. Samuel looks at Tom and sees him as the answer to his prayers. Although loser is the first word Tom hears after forgetting, Samuel calls him a finder and asks him to look for his son.
Armed with his notebook, in which he compulsively records what he finds and a mind so empty of memory and preconception that each new experience, large and small, resonates in his heart and soul and intellect, Tom sets out to find Daniel. On his 3-month journey, he finds Jenks, a homeless man who sees ghosts, Jeans, a claustrophobic chicken cooker from Jamaica who longs to get home so he can marry his sweetheart, Gina, and Pam, a beautiful young girl sliding down the slippery slope into prostitution. He also finds that he possesses strengths and abilities; he can spell, he can run fast and swim, he can work out deals for food, a locker, clothing and the occasional shower, and he can make things true by writing about them.
Martine Leavitt’s Tom Finder is a moving story about a young man who looks for another lost youth and finds himself. Written in words that flow like poetry, this book is a must read for students from Grade 7.
Fern Folio Editor

Kat’s Fall by Shelley Hrdlitschka

fernfolio — Fri, 06 Apr 2007 22:50:45 +0000

Estranged from his mother, neglected by his truck-driver father, and entirely responsible for his eleven year-old deaf sister, Kat, fifteen year-old Darcy struggles to cope with almost overwhelming emotional pain. Despite the efforts of his teacher, Ms. Rose, at the alternative school where he’s been sent because of his unwillingness – or inability – to establish social relationships with others, and the caring of Gem, a classmate who keeps reaching out even when he rejects her, Darcy is unable to stop himself from throwing up walls. He loves and trusts only two people, his sister, Kat, and young Sam, the four year-old deaf girl he baby sits after school each day.
Darcy’s life begins to spin out of control when he learns that his mother, sent to prison for throwing Kat off an apartment balcony when he was four, is going to be paroled and wants to see him and his sister. Their father makes it clear that he expects Kat, with whom he has never felt comfortable and never bothered to learn to communicate with, to go to live with her mother. Darcy is torn between his refusal to have anything to do with his mother, and his fear that he will lose contact with Kat.
Things become far more complicated when Sam makes an accusation against Darcy that leaves him isolated and bewildered. Then a sudden flashback to the day of Kat’s fall from that apartment balcony brings another shocking revelation.
To deal with his feelings of fear and guilt and loss of control and isolation, and although he’s promised Kat to stop, Darcy begins to self-mutilate. It is only when he acknowledges that he needs the help of those who care about him, and accepts that help, that Darcy can put the past behind him and begin to heal.
FernFolio Editor