Melissa Albert's work has continued to evolve since the publication of her Hazel Wood duology. With each novel, her storytelling becomes more assured and layered. Her newest novel, The Children, marks her first foray into writing for adults and leaves a strong, lingering impression.
The best way to describe The Children would be if David Lynch (rest in peace) tackled a fairy tale. The story follows Guinevere Sharpe, daughter of famed children's novelist Edith Sharpe. When she and her brother, Ennis, were children, their mother wrote a successful series of fantasy novels inspired by them and their life on a remote farmhouse in Vermont.
To the world, Guin's childhood is one of adventure and magic, with their home becoming a place of pilgrimage for ambitious artists looking to bask in the shadow of Edith's spotlight, only to find themselves drained of inspiration and talent. To Guin, her childhood is one of neglect.
In Guin's adulthood, she acts as the official stand-in for their mother, promoting the series Edith never got to finish before a house fire claimed her life and the lives of several others, save Guin and Ennis. Now estranged from her brother and struggling not only with the legacy of her mother but also with the complicated and dark reality of her childhood, Guin is forced to come to terms with her trauma and take creative control of her life and likeness.
Melissa Albert uses metaphor and symbolism throughout the novel, giving the story a surreal essence that often inspires an edge-of-your-seat sense of dread. As events unfold, it becomes clear that something very bad happened, but because much of the story is filtered through the perspective of a child via flashbacks, the details grow hazy and fantastical.
The Children is dreamy yet brutally real, spectacular and strange yet crushingly sad. The story is likely to stay with readers for quite some time.
UnCovered Review by Sam LeRoy, ACLS Mays Landing Branch
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