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The Mysterious Hubbub
A sailing ship comes across the edge of the Frozen Sea, where a fierce battle had once been fought, and its screams and sounds which had been frozen in the cold air to begin to melt.
33 pages, Hardcover
First published September 24, 1990
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Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews
February 23, 2021
A sailing ship comes upon a host of sinister sounds when it approaches the edge of the Frozen Sea in this original fairy-tale from Australian author/artist Amanda Walsh. The captain of the ship explains that a terrible battle was fought in this area a year before, and that the sounds of that calamity, frozen since that time, are now thawing out. Realizing that there is nothing to be frightened of, the people begin playing with the sounds, the children even attempting to eat them. Eventually, when they have all melted together, the ship sails on, leaving peace behind it...
Until picking up The Mysterious Hubbub, I had been under the impression that the only one of Amanda Walsh's titles to be published in the United States was The Buried Moon , in 1991, but apparently this one was also published here, the year before. In any case, I found her story in this one decidedly odd. The playful tone, once the people realized they weren't in danger, struck me as somehow oblivious, given the tragedy of what went before. Does one visit a battlefield, or the site of some atrocity, and throw a party? On the other hand, there were aspects to this tale that I found very creative. The way in which the sound-words could be seen - they were represented in color, visually, against a backdrop of black and white illustrations - and the children's evident desire to eat them, given their candy-like appearance, reminded me of scenes from Norton Juster's classic fantasy novel, The Phantom Tollbooth , in which Milo buys edible letters from the market. I also liked the general idea of the story - the echoes of the past being frozen, and then suddenly thawing, when people came near - even if the execution was a little uneven. I think Walsh had a good idea here, but somehow didn't quite bring it to life. I'd recommend this one chiefly to picture-book readers looking for quirky, obscure titles with a creative premise.
Until picking up The Mysterious Hubbub, I had been under the impression that the only one of Amanda Walsh's titles to be published in the United States was The Buried Moon , in 1991, but apparently this one was also published here, the year before. In any case, I found her story in this one decidedly odd. The playful tone, once the people realized they weren't in danger, struck me as somehow oblivious, given the tragedy of what went before. Does one visit a battlefield, or the site of some atrocity, and throw a party? On the other hand, there were aspects to this tale that I found very creative. The way in which the sound-words could be seen - they were represented in color, visually, against a backdrop of black and white illustrations - and the children's evident desire to eat them, given their candy-like appearance, reminded me of scenes from Norton Juster's classic fantasy novel, The Phantom Tollbooth , in which Milo buys edible letters from the market. I also liked the general idea of the story - the echoes of the past being frozen, and then suddenly thawing, when people came near - even if the execution was a little uneven. I think Walsh had a good idea here, but somehow didn't quite bring it to life. I'd recommend this one chiefly to picture-book readers looking for quirky, obscure titles with a creative premise.
February 16, 2018
Strange, violent story
Displaying 1 - 2 of 2 reviews