Mar 18, 2002 THE KITE RIDER by Geraldine McCaughrean, HarperCollins, June 2002

So, who's worse--the guy who kills your father and then burns up your house and livelihood in order to get his paws on your beautiful mother, or the great uncle who is doing his best to sell off that beautiful mother to the killer?  And what has Kublai Kahn got to do with this historic adventure story that poses the question to teenagers--What if you are taught to always obey your relatives and those relatives make the Dursleys look like Ozzy and Harriet?

Haoyou is the boy living this nightmare, adrift in a sea of tradition, obedience, and superstition, who takes the daring gamble of offering himself as a wind tester:

"...Again the crew tugged on the rope, to tilt it back into the face of the wind.  Haoyou's head cracked against the matting, and the rope handles burned the skin off his palms.  He could hear the fibers of the rope creaking under the strain, his ribs bending inward where the harness crossed his chest.  Perhaps his kite would burst apart.  Perhaps there would be no air at all to breathe at the top of the sky"

The key to this riveting story set in thirteenth century Cathay (China) is a strong, cunning, heroic female character--a distant relative named Mipeng.  I was continually touched and astounded by her bravery and intelligence as well as her friendship and support of Haoyou.  She is fiercely determined to strip that blindfold of obedience from his eyes.

"And all at once, as if fear were a cloud layer through which he had risen, Haoyou looked about him and saw the whole world beneath him. And it was his.  Like a sliver shield daubed with blue and green, it throbbed, convex, complex, beautiful.  He was a swimmer floating on the surface of an ocean, borne up by such a clarity of water that he could see each sunken treasure, each darting fish, each twist of coral down there in the unbreathing fathoms below.  He, out of all its sluggish inhabitants, could breathe!  He alone had mastery over this shining province so beautiful that it spangled red and black and green in front of his eyes."

It is also fascinating to get such a vivid taste, vision, and smell of the Cathay encountered by Marco Polo--from the grimy, oily seaside villages to the opulence of the aforementioned Mongol conqueror.

And it's a rare adventure story that could top that feeling McCaughrean gives us in THE KITE RIDER--of flying hundreds of feet in the air, over a land of long ago, anchored to Mother Earth by a kitestring.

Richie Partington

http://richiespicks.com

BudNotBuddy@aol.com