All fall down
John Lampen discovers a book where courage and love are the guide through a world of horror
In Sally Nicholls’ two previous books (Ways to Live Forever and Season of Secrets) the leading characters faced death, loss and terror. But both books had a lightness of touch that encouraged young readers to enjoy them, with laughter seasoning the serious issues. Her new novel has a different tone.
All Fall Down is the tale of a group of children confronting the inexorable advance of the Black Death across their world. There are few moments of happiness or relief once they start to lose friends, family and beasts and also the certainties of their religion. If the plague is a punishment, why are the babies dying? Whether the adults act in cowardice, or with helpless bravery, the outcome seems to be the same. In the end the pestilence moves on and a semblance of normal life returns; but everyone who survives will be scarred by what they have seen and lost.
Why tell such a story? This question made me look at the models of success and happiness offered to today’s teenagers. When they are told that celebrity, sex and money are the keys to happiness and triumph (often through violence) is the solution to conflict, they are given shoddy resources for meeting the real pains and challenges of life. Hayao Miyazaki, the director of Spirited Away, wrote about his film: ‘Once Chihiro encounters a crisis, she will surely be aware of her capacity for patience and for decisive judgement and action… In fact Chihiro’s being strong enough not to be eaten up is just what makes her a heroine. She is a heroine not because she is beautiful or because she possesses a unique mind… Therefore it is a good story for ten-year-old girls.’ (And boys, one might add.)
Sally seems to me to have the same aims as Miyazaki. Her grim story shows the courage, determination, loyalty and love that guide fourteen-year-old Isabel through a world of horror. It suggests that these unglamorous qualities are what everyone needs to live their life. Towards the end Isabel sums up:
The truth is, the end of the world is easy to weather if you don’t expect to survive it. If all you have to do is to wrap your mantle tightly round yourself and live another day. Anyone can do that, I reckon. After Alice died, I never really thought I’d do anything but die too.
Living is harder than dying. I think of Joan’s baby, Sarah. I don’t want to live in a house with a baby and not love it, but I can’t love Sarah without remembering Edward. And I’m not sure that I’m brave enough to remember all the people I have to remember, and carry all the grief I have to bear…
‘What am I going to do?’ I say to the grass and the little black ant which is climbing up a dandelion… I know what the answer is, and I’m not surprised when the monk gives it. ‘You’re going to live,’ he says. ‘What else are you going to do?’
This is a brave book, and not one to give lightly as a present. If you give it to the right teenager, be sure to talk about it with them too.
All Fall Down, Sally Nicholls, Scholastic, ISBN 9781407121727, £7.99
