Borders are strange things. Some are physical things: a river, a canyon, a wall. Others are more conceptual: the lines between countries, for instance. And then there are those that are magical: the borders between worlds. Today’s stack of books has stories about crossing borders of all sorts.
Sublimation by Isabel J. Kim
I’m going to start with a book that really wowed me with its premise and the way it was explored. Sublimation is set in our world, though with one significant difference: when you cross a border, there’s a chance that you split in two. It has to do with your intentions and beliefs, but there’s a version of you that stays behind, and a version of you that goes. But if the two versions of a person come into physical contact with each other, they remerge into a single person again.
Rose and Soyoung are “instances”—Rose lives in American and Soyoung lives in Korea. When they were ten, their mother tried to immigrate to America, but they both split at the border, leaving themselves behind. Now, Rose is thirty and has never been back to Korea; when Soyoung calls her to tell her that their grandfather has died, she decides to go back for his funeral, meeting her instance in person for the first time since they split. Rose is pretty happy with her life, but Soyoung envies her and wants to reintegrate, to have all of Rose’s experiences of growing up and living in New York.
Yujin is Soyoung’s best friend; they reconnected sometime during college after a period of estrangement. He had gone to college in New York, and at one point when returning to school for winter break, he instanced unexpectedly, so now there’s a version of himself in the US and one in Korea. Unlike Rose and Soyoung, Yujin and YJ keep in touch regularly. They even have a long-term plan: Yujin studied science and YJ went into business, and they’re hoping YJ can apply for dual-citizenship and then they can remerge and have the best of both worlds.
Although the story centers around these Korean characters, the book also has lots of interludes that explore a bit more of this world, sometimes recasting ancient stories in light of this version of reality. The Odyssey comes up quite a bit, with discussions about the two versions of Odysseus, the one who went on all the adventures that we’ve read in our own universe, and the one who stayed home the entire time. Another story that comes up is the Garden of Eden—because when Adam and Eve were cast out of the Garden, there were also versions of themselves that stayed behind. Kim also puts a spin on some Korean folktales. It’s a fascinating change to the stories, giving them new meanings.
The existence of instances has a lot of other implications on things like how the government handles immigration (including instancing and reintegration). Mergebreak, the tech company that YJ works for, has a consumer product that prevents reintegration most of the time, but now they’re working on another product that claims it can even reverse reintegration.
We get to see the story from the point of view of the four main characters, and Kim does a great job of showing the differences in how they see themselves and how others see them. Though I will warn you that if you’re somebody who gets frustrated with poor communication and misunderstandings between characters, there’s a whole lot of that here. Almost every combination of these four characters has relationships in which they aren’t really on the same page but think they understand the other, and at least part of the plot is driven by these assumptions. One of the curious aspects of the book (that took me a little bit to get used to) was that it’s mostly told in second person—always an odd choice in my opinion when it’s not a Choose-Your-Own-Adventure book—but then later there’s a shift, and it’s used in a really effective way.
Sublimation is an enchanting story that makes its outlandish premise feel real, and then uses it to explore the experience of immigration and family and identity, with some great observations of the tech industry as well. It’s one of my favorite reads of the year so far.
The Endless Game written by J. D. Amato, illustrated by Sophie Morse
Okay, now for something a bit lighter, at least on the surface: capture the flag! In this graphic novel, Fred has just moved to Lakeside, Illinois, and when he goes looking for some kids to hang out, he’s initially treated with some suspicion and hostility, suspected to be a spy. But a spy for what?
Well, as it turns out, all of the kids in town are involved in a game of capture the flag that has been going for decades, split between the Uphill and the Downhill parts of town. It is played for the entire summer, and each side has a huge base for their flag, prisons for their captives, and specialized roles for all of the kids involved. There’s a neutral Council of Homeschooled Kids who serve as the court for the game, and the adults are not allowed to interfere with the game—though those who grew up there are all familiar with the rules themselves. It’s taken extremely seriously: kids who get captured have to spend all day in jail (until the streetlights come on) and then report back to jail the next day, unless they get set freed by a teammate. Not even other summer activities take precedence over being jailed.
Fred is soon recruited by Downhill and sworn into the game, and he learns that strange things have been afoot. Downhill’s previous king was banished—he’d almost succeeded in stealing Uphill’s flag the prior summer, but then was accused of vandalism and was shipped off to Montana, throwing Downhill into disarray. Some of the Downhill kids are convinced that he was framed, but Uphill’s king has some powerful parents and it’s been impossible to get the proof they need.
The Endless Game is largely about Fred finding a place for himself and figuring out who he is, so that’s not so unusual from other kids’ comics. It’s about making friends, standing up to bullies, and having an incredible summer. But the high-stakes, unending game of capture the flag (and the strange culture that has grown with it) makes for an intriguing setting, even if the “good kids” and “bad kids” dichotomy is a bit simplistic.
Wildwood by Colin Meloy, illustrated by Carson Ellis
I mentioned last week that I’d finally started reading Wildwood, which was originally published way back in 2011. I don’t have any good excuse for not having read it well before now, but with the animated film coming out later this year, I figured it was finally time.
In case you’re one of the few people left who still haven’t read it, here’s a quick summary: in the world of this story, Portland is only on the east side of the Willamette River; on the west, past the Industrial Wastes, lies the Impassable Wilderness. That’s how it appears on maps, and nobody ever goes there. I mean, come on, it’s impassable. But then one day a bunch of crows fly down and grab Prue’s baby brother Mac and fly off into forest, and she decides she has to go track him down. Her classmate Curtis follows her, and the two find themselves in a strange world, with talking animals and a bird kingdom and even a small town in the south where the Pittock Mansion (an actual Portland landmark) serves as the government offices. The two soon get separated, and both end up getting entangled in a larger plot that soon involves the whole wood.
The book reminded me in parts of Narnia—a passage into a different world with colorful characters and talking animals and mysterious plots. There’s even a beautiful lady who’s clearly bad news but Curtis immediately falls for her story about her rightful place, and at first I was quite annoyed that he (like Edmund) was so easily swayed by a pretty face and some tasty treats. But then I remembered that, first, Curtis is only twelve, and second, the state of our country shows that people who should have much more sense than a twelve-year-old are easily swayed by pretty faces and promises of power. So, uh, I guess that tracks.
While there is ultimately a happy ending (kind of a spoiler, but not really—it’s a kid’s book), it’s not entirely a fairy tale ending, either. There are huge battles and there’s lots of death (even if in most cases it’s not primary characters), and some of it gets pretty gruesome. And I would say that the ending isn’t happy for everyone, and there are also some characters—looking at you, Prue’s parents—who maybe got a happier ending than they really deserved. At any rate, it’s an exciting adventure and it’s easy to see why LAIKA is making a movie of it. I’ve got the other two Wildwood books on my shelf too, so I’ll be digging into those soon.
Lightfall Book 4: A Place Between by Tim Probert
I’ve written about the first three books in this graphic novel series here, and my daughter and I were both excited for the fourth book.
Bea and Cad were shipwrecked and separated. Cad encounters several Spirits, including one who takes him to another realm, kind of a limbo between life and death. Bea finds herself in the capital city Pellydir, where the king thinks she is a spy at best, or an omen of doom at worst, and sentences her to death. Yeah, there’s some heavy stuff happening in this chapter of the story, and both characters have a lot to figure out, including things like whether they’ve been doing the right thing up until now. They’ve discovered that their actions—what they thought was saving the world—has had some dire consequences for other people. Things are complicated.
I really love the artwork in this series, the way that both Cad and Bea are navigating their way through these difficult decisions, though I also wish that I got to read a bit more story before this book ended and we have to wait for the next one!
Disclosure: I received review copies of these books. Affiliate links to Bookshop.org help support my writing and independent booksellers!
