Post by Koalapupu on Aug 27, 2006 6:18:43 GMT -5
"You dress in grey and you hide in red. But your thoughts are open. They sit in your eyes and they do not waver".
Ok, for the fantasy theme I read Aila Meriluoto's book Vihreä Tukka, "Green Hair". This is probably the first fantasy book I have ever read--I got it from my aunt. It inspired me later in high school to dye my hair green, and thus be bullied endlessly by people who said I'm not a real punk because I eat meat. Who ever said I was trying to be punk? Anyway, high school traumas aside and to the book.
Just an aside first, though: this is a book I think Tori would like, as it stresses how humans cannot exist without fairies (joy and happiness) and "trolls" (forces that come from deep within the ground).
The events are such:
Our protagonist is a young girl called Eintel who lives with her grandmother and grandfather in Grey Tree's Village. She, as a fair amount of the people there, are fairly poor and they make their living by washing rich peoples' clothes. Eintel is terribly envious of other girls--they have wonderful, rich and silky hair, while her red hair is a terrible matted mess. The reason for this is that her grandmother makes her dye it red with natural herbs--her original hair color is green. Because anything that is deviant is prohibited or under scrutiny, Eintel has to hide her green hair, and make herself "ugly" and invisible. When she tries to ask her Granny for a reason to this hiding, she is always shushed.
One day on her trip to the river, she notices a boy hanging out on a wooden fence near a forest. The boy tells her that because she is different, she can walk through gates that are within herself, and make herself disappear. She must learn how to walk through gates that aren't there. She begins to spend time with this magical boy who not only teaches Eintel how to walk through the gate in the forest, in herself, but also how to fly.
When the grandmother hears about this, she is obviously shocked because Eintel has finally figured out her original roots: her father was a fairy-like creature and her mother a human. Neither of them are alive due to terrible witch-hunts that took place when Eintel was just born. That is why the grandmother has been trying to hide Eintel from the government--but now it doesn't work any more, and the girl has to escape.
She goes on a mission to find the person who killed her father--a human who was envious of fairies. She wants to tell the world that in order for humans to exist, the fairies and the trolls have to exist too, all as one. When she enters the humans' world she is chided for being naive.
This is only the first part of the book--the second part of the novel takes place beyond the fence and is a kind of a classic fight between good and evil, but... with a sort of a feminist twist to it. And the novel is also somehow so very Finnish. Although it's fantasy, it could almost be read like a historical story about some small village in the middle of Finland. The language isn't pompous, there are no swords or sorcerers. It's just... I don't know. I really, really like this book. There are some sentences in there that I just want to write down because they are so good.
It definitely gave a sort of an ego-boost for a pre-teen girl who didn't feel like she would fit in with the rest. I could pretend I was Eintel! It's like "The Ugly Duckling" but with humans and more social commentary!
I don't know whether this book is translated, but I sure wish it would be! For a young adults' book it's terribly profound but at the same time playful and yes, naive. But in a wonderful way.
Ok, for the fantasy theme I read Aila Meriluoto's book Vihreä Tukka, "Green Hair". This is probably the first fantasy book I have ever read--I got it from my aunt. It inspired me later in high school to dye my hair green, and thus be bullied endlessly by people who said I'm not a real punk because I eat meat. Who ever said I was trying to be punk? Anyway, high school traumas aside and to the book.
Just an aside first, though: this is a book I think Tori would like, as it stresses how humans cannot exist without fairies (joy and happiness) and "trolls" (forces that come from deep within the ground).
The events are such:
Our protagonist is a young girl called Eintel who lives with her grandmother and grandfather in Grey Tree's Village. She, as a fair amount of the people there, are fairly poor and they make their living by washing rich peoples' clothes. Eintel is terribly envious of other girls--they have wonderful, rich and silky hair, while her red hair is a terrible matted mess. The reason for this is that her grandmother makes her dye it red with natural herbs--her original hair color is green. Because anything that is deviant is prohibited or under scrutiny, Eintel has to hide her green hair, and make herself "ugly" and invisible. When she tries to ask her Granny for a reason to this hiding, she is always shushed.
One day on her trip to the river, she notices a boy hanging out on a wooden fence near a forest. The boy tells her that because she is different, she can walk through gates that are within herself, and make herself disappear. She must learn how to walk through gates that aren't there. She begins to spend time with this magical boy who not only teaches Eintel how to walk through the gate in the forest, in herself, but also how to fly.
When the grandmother hears about this, she is obviously shocked because Eintel has finally figured out her original roots: her father was a fairy-like creature and her mother a human. Neither of them are alive due to terrible witch-hunts that took place when Eintel was just born. That is why the grandmother has been trying to hide Eintel from the government--but now it doesn't work any more, and the girl has to escape.
She goes on a mission to find the person who killed her father--a human who was envious of fairies. She wants to tell the world that in order for humans to exist, the fairies and the trolls have to exist too, all as one. When she enters the humans' world she is chided for being naive.
This is only the first part of the book--the second part of the novel takes place beyond the fence and is a kind of a classic fight between good and evil, but... with a sort of a feminist twist to it. And the novel is also somehow so very Finnish. Although it's fantasy, it could almost be read like a historical story about some small village in the middle of Finland. The language isn't pompous, there are no swords or sorcerers. It's just... I don't know. I really, really like this book. There are some sentences in there that I just want to write down because they are so good.
It definitely gave a sort of an ego-boost for a pre-teen girl who didn't feel like she would fit in with the rest. I could pretend I was Eintel! It's like "The Ugly Duckling" but with humans and more social commentary!
I don't know whether this book is translated, but I sure wish it would be! For a young adults' book it's terribly profound but at the same time playful and yes, naive. But in a wonderful way.
Maybe I should check if the library has it. It really sounded interesting.
