Changing things up a bit this month by focusing on a children’s Fantasy book instead of the usual adult Fiction. Some of you reading this know why I am temporarily venturing into children’s books. It is for the specific purpose of learning and writing at the same time, but I have been doing that for over a year now. So, let’s see how this change from the ordinary turns out.

            In my local library, this book is marked as reading level 4.9, which means, I learned from a chart posted on a wall in the children’s section, that this book is for children who are in the ninth month of fourth grade. So, this is considered the appropriate level of reading for a child preparing for the fifth grade. I don’t quite remember the stories I read as a fourth grader, which made me wonder whether they were as complicated and as gruesome as Gregor the Overlander.

            Reading this book as an adult, I was conflicted between the life lessons Gregor, the eleven-year-old protagonist, learns and the experiences he must endure to learn them. Can a child of that age, not even past the sixth grade, walk away from war and death completely unscathed, mentally and emotionally? Do eleven-year-old children immediately stand tall in the face of bigger and scarier beings? In our daily lives, how many preteen children do we know to stand up ready to physically combat adults let alone giant bats, spiders, rats, and cockroaches?

            I could not get past these questions as I read this book. Gregor is a brave boy, that’s for sure. He is resourceful, protective, kind, empathetic, and at times, like a child, scared and tries to hide his fear behind bravado. He is not afraid to pick up a weapon to defend himself and his two-year-old sister when they end up in the Underland full of confusing creatures and situations. But again, as a child, he seems to think very fast on his feet given how clueless he is about this new world, the beings who reside there, and the rules you need to follow to not only survive but win.

            For example, Gregor converses with adults in the Underland as though he himself is an adult. The Underland adults also engage Gregor into strategic conversations about war like they would engage adults. In the Overland, in other words our above-ground world as we know it, children are typically not involved in discussions, let alone decisions, about war strategy and weaponry. I did not get the impression from Gregor’s life above ground that he should be thought of as an adult, except when a woman in his building offered to read tarot cards for him.

            I wondered if the tarot card incident was supposed to give us permission to think of Gregor as an adult even though he is very much an eleven-year-old boy who wishes he could go to summer camp instead of taking care of his toddler sister and aging grandmother while his mom works herself to the bone. I don’t know if the book was indeed giving us that permission, but the questions kept rising in my mind as I read the story. I had to keep reminding myself that Gregor is only eleven years old. He is only eleven years old when he witnesses live creatures burn to death. When he sees an attempted murder and decides to intervene. When he watches another human splatter to pieces on a set of giant boulders after falling from a great height.

            Gregor the Overlander is Book One in The Underland Chronicles so I might read the next book to find out how Gregor recovers from his first set of experiences in the Underland. Does he have nightmares for a certain period after returning home with everything he thought he had lost? Does he wake up sweating in the middle of the night? Does he talk or scream in his sleep? Does he have to seek help from a mental professional? What impact has the experience had on his overall mental health and well-being? I hope the next book addresses some of these things.

            Perhaps this book was meant to show a child as a brave warrior who is not phased by the trauma of war and death. Someone who can be an example or a role model to a child reading this story, afraid of facing something challenging in his or her own life. Perhaps this book is meant to give courage to children who otherwise may not be able to find it on their own. But should there be certain elements of reality in even a Fantasy story when it is written for children? To keep impressionable children from thinking what ordinary adults would not. That yes, some things are possible with courage and luck. But other things come with a certain set of consequences even the bravest cannot escape. Perhaps there is a balance to be shown between bravery and its unintended consequences to the one being brave? Just something I can’t stop kicking around.