November’s Choice From The Reader Bookshelf

The Reader Bookshelf is a  carefully curated collection of literature for adults and children, exploring a different theme each year, this year’s theme ‘Wonder’ is about being bold, being curious and being open. Staff and volunteers around the country have selected 12 titles for adults which explore what 'Wonder' means to them.

We're delving into The Reader Bookshelf with a review by our Head of Shared Reading Practice, Clare Ellis. This month Clare shares her thoughts on Little Boy Lost by Marghanita Laski.

Little Boy Lost was first read in Shared Reading groups over a decade ago. Clare has recently begun reading the novel with a group based at The Mansion House in Calderstones Park:

'It's too late,' Hilary said in a dead voice. 'I don't want to feel anything any more.'

Wonder involves the activation of thoughts and feelings, fears and hopes; it means we have to take an active role in living, and that can be a big ask depending on our individual circumstances. For Hilary, the central figure in Little Boy Lost, wonder and hope are especially painful, and he’s taught himself to live without them. Hilary was separated from his son at birth during the turmoil of World War Two, when Hilary had to flee France, the birth country of his wife and child, and return to England. Tragically, his wife is later murdered and his son is hidden for safety, his whereabouts unknown even to his father. Several years pass, and Hilary has given up hope of finding his son, when a stranger named Pierre arrives, telling Hilary that he may be able to help find his lost child. In order to set out upon this journey of potential reunion Hilary must begin wondering again about what might be possible. In so many ways this novel is about coming back to life, and what that demands; how we can learn to feel again, and the part wonder plays in this process of reawakening. It is fascinating to see how, as my Shared Reading group at Calderstones read our way slowly through the novel, the group members shift and move in their relationship to Hilary, and how the richness and honesty of the novel draws out feelings and thoughts about our human capacity for empathy, happiness and hope.