It's Never Too Late To Build A Bridge

The Bridge to Terebithia by Katherine Paterson

Dear Saralinda*,

Books written by Katherine Paterson tend to make me a bit nervous. I'll buy the book, knowing that it will be good, but a little apprehensive about the experience of reading it.

You see, Paterson doesn't shy away from presenting difficult subjects. I also think someone forgot to tell her that books are supposed to have happy endings. Certainly Paterson shuns the fairy tale ending, exchanging the "happily ever after" for an "I think I can, I think I can" attitude on the part of her protagonists.

Paterson has written many books-including many Newbery Honor and Newbery Award books. If they have anything in common (at least among the ones I've read), is that they all have an ability to take average kids who reside on the far side of popularity and wring our heart with their struggles.

The Bridge to Terabithia is perhaps the best known of these. It is a book will lull you into loving the characters and then bring you to tears not only because of their tragedies, but because of their triumphs. I re-read this book a few weeks before sending it to you, and even knowing how the book would end was not protection from the tears.

So why would I recommend a book to you that makes me cry? After all, we hardly need to introduce things into our life to make us sad. The Bridge to Terabithia is not just a sad, depressing book. Rather, it is a sad, uplifting one.

It starts with Jesse, a 10-year-old boy, waking up in the morning to go practice his running. He's the middle child of five-just like your father. Except, unlike your father, he's the only boy. Jesse wants to be the fastest boy in the fifth grade and has been practicing every morning to make sure that happens.

This morning he learns that a family is moving into the abandoned farmhouse near where he lives with his parents. He soon meets Leslie, the only daughter of two writers who have moved into the farmhouse to get away from the bustle of society.

Leslie is different from any other girl he's ever met. She's well-read and is able to bring the magic of the stories she's read alive. She introduces Jesse to this wonderful world not by loaning him books, but by creating Terabithia with him. Terabithia is a fantasy land of their creation where they reign as king and queen.

Some people would classify The Bridge to Terabithia as a "coming of age" story. However, it covers only a year of Jesse and Leslie's life and you'll close the book knowing that Jesse still has a lot of growing and changing to do.

In the beginning of the book, Jesse isn't too hip on the idea of changing or indeed of anything that is different from himself and the world he knows. That is part of the magic of Terabithia. It introduces him to a world other than the one he has known before.

I've never been very good at putting an age range on a book. I worry sometimes that you might consider the books I'm sending you "too young" for you. The Bridge to Terabithia is about two ten-year-olds (who become 11 during the book). Yet, the way Katherine Paterson writes about them, they could be ageless. They're younger than you, but it isn't hard to relate to them. I'm 33 and I was able to relate to them. I'm not sure we ever outgrow the need to explore, the need to expand our world, and the need for friendship.

Jesse and Leslie are two very different people. His family is poor and large, hers is wealthy and small. He has had limited exposure to the world and reads very little. She has traveled large portions of the country and is so conversant with books that many of the stories have become her own. Jesse is a conformist, while Leslie is very independent. Yet, they find they have enough in common to become close friends. As their friendship grows, so do their common interests.

Surprisingly, there are some libraries that have pulled this book from their shelves. It is on the American Library Associations list of most frequently challenged (or banned) books. It's hard for me to understand why. There are some unorthodox views on Christianity expressed, but it is a very minor part of the book and not at all what I would consider blasphemous or offensive.

The Bridge to Terabithia is a book worth experiencing because it speaks to our soul-it reminds us that we are more than just flesh, blood, and bones. There is more to our existence than just performing our tasks and striving to be better than the other people around us. Rather there are great riches that we can only partake of when we share them with someone else.

Love,
Aunt Bridgette

I'm reading and reviewing an overlarge stack of juvenile fiction in search of books that my 13-year-old niece would enjoy. With each book that I mail her, I'm sending along a letter sharing my experience with the book. After I strip out the strictly personal information that the letters contain, I'll post them as reviews. After all, my goal in the letter is to encourage her to read the book and make her experience with it more enjoyable, perhaps I can do the same for you.

Since I've started this project, I've expanded it a little. Some of the reviews that I write will be for books that go to my other niece, "Saralinda's" 10-year old sister. It's what I did with the Mary Kate and Ashley book. In the future, I'll try to come up with another name for those reviews so you'll know whether I'm writing to a 13-year-old or a 10-year-old.

* I've changed my niece's name to protect her identity. Saralinda is a name I borrowed from another beloved children's book. She's the princess in James Thurber's The 13 Clocks.

- B. Redman