{"id":11650,"date":"2023-03-25T20:40:09","date_gmt":"2023-03-26T00:40:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=11650"},"modified":"2026-01-27T23:13:25","modified_gmt":"2026-01-28T04:13:25","slug":"25074-matti-charlton-youre-mine-%e2%80%95-a-true-story-for-brave-little-ones","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/?p=11650","title":{"rendered":"25074. (Matti Charlton) You\u2019re Mine \u2015 A True Story for Brave Little Ones"},"content":{"rendered":"

<\/a>There are not many books for chil\u00addren in which death is the main top\u00adic. Mar\u00adjorie Kin\u00adnan Rawl\u00adings\u2019 1938 nov\u00adel The Year\u00adling, <\/em>which dealt with death from a child\u2019s point of view, comes to mind, but it was not con\u00adceived by it\u2019s author as a \u201cchil\u00addren\u2019s book.\u201d It is today gen\u00ader\u00adal\u00adly shelved with \u201cyoung adult\u201d fic\u00adtion in libraries, but that was not a cat\u00ade\u00adgo\u00adry in use at the time of its writ\u00ading. The author was address\u00ading adults in a sto\u00adry writ\u00adten from the point of view of a child. Its clar\u00adi\u00adty and emo\u00adtion\u00adal inten\u00adsi\u00adty allowed it to reach a younger audi\u00adence. We expect a teenag\u00ader to have some con\u00adcern with the idea of death.<\/span><\/p>\n

But when it comes to books for younger chil\u00addren, death is still a taboo top\u00adic. It is some\u00adthing that, many believe, chil\u00addren should not be exposed to in fic\u00adtion, or even allowed to think about. This pre\u00adsumes that no small child will encounter death, or have to think of it, or need to under\u00adstand it. Except, of course, the chil\u00addren in Uvalde, Texas, and Sandy Hook, Con\u00adnecti\u00adcut. Except, of course, the mil\u00adlions of small chil\u00addren who have had to expe\u00adri\u00adence a death in the fam\u00adi\u00adly, or even the death of a beloved pet. And that does\u00adn\u2019t even take into account parts of the world torn up by war, where small chil\u00addren are drenched in the stench of death. There aren\u2019t many chil\u00addren in Ukraine or Yemen, today, who are obliv\u00adi\u00adous to death. Reli\u00adgion is of lit\u00adtle help, here. It is far more con\u00adcerned with deny\u00ading death than with under\u00adstand\u00ading it, or prepar\u00ading for it. At its worst, it attempts to dis\u00admiss life as a mere pre\u00adlude to an imag\u00adined eter\u00adnal exis\u00adtence \u2026 at once oblit\u00ader\u00adat\u00ading death from thought and oblit\u00ader\u00adat\u00ading life from significance.<\/span><\/p>\n

So I would rec\u00adom\u00admend Mat\u00adti Charl\u00adton\u2019s  You\u2019re Mine<\/em>. I wish I had such a book avail\u00adable to me when I was very young. In very straight\u00adfor\u00adward lan\u00adguage, it explains death, how it is inevitable, and why its exis\u00adtence under\u00adlies the pre\u00adcious\u00adness of life: \u201cBe grate\u00adful for your life. Every day. Every sec\u00adond. Cher\u00adish every moment while your life is still yours.<\/em>\u201d The nar\u00adra\u00adtor is death itself, por\u00adtrayed as a mon\u00adstrous beast, speak\u00ading to the read\u00ader, \u201cLit\u00adtle One.\u201d While the art\u00adwork of the book is designed to be just scary enough for a child to han\u00addle, it also evokes the beau\u00adty of life in a way that a child can under\u00adstand. It is refresh\u00ading\u00adly free of eva\u00adsion, deceit, or exis\u00adten\u00adtial\u00adist blar\u00adney. Many adults would ben\u00ade\u00adfit from read\u00ading it, since, as the author says in a post\u00adscript: \u201c..we are all Lit\u00adtle Ones, after all.<\/em>\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

There are not many books for chil\u00addren in which death is the main top\u00adic. Mar\u00adjorie Kin\u00adnan Rawl\u00adings\u2019 1938 nov\u00adel The Year\u00adling, which dealt with death from a child\u2019s point of view, comes to mind, but it was not con\u00adceived by it\u2019s \u2026<\/p>\n

Read more \u00bb<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"wp_typography_post_enhancements_disabled":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[946,1536],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11650","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-b-reading","category-bd-reading-2023"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11650","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11650"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11650\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11653,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11650\/revisions\/11653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11650"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11650"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.philpaine.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11650"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}