The White Darkness by Geraldine McCaughrean

“The only happy thing was that Sym (your main character)didn't die. The only good thing about this book is that you can't guess what on earth's going to happen next.” Amazon book reviews- Liz (SA!)
Carnegie award winning author and three times Whitbread Children’s Book Award, Geraldine McCaughrean, has produced an interesting novel based on the story of Captain Lawrence Edward Grace Oates, a nineteenth century explorer. The story is set mostly in the heart of Antarctica, the first person account of emotions channelled by a fourteen year old Symone Wates. Symone (Sym) is not very popular at school and has an “imaginary” friend in Captain Oates- or Titus as she prefers to call him. Her love life is non-existent and her one friend is in her own world of girly magazines.
A plot begins in which the reasons for certain events become clear throughout the story line. Symone has an “uncle”, or rather a friend of her father’s who she believes is a trustworthy and highly intelligent man. Her reasons for believing in him and his wisdom so strongly, she thinks are linked to her father’s feelings towards her. Spread out through the story are emotional feelings towards her father’s disregard for her feelings and interests, along with a few minor comments to certain mind games that are brought up by her Uncle Victor to improve her own outlook on life and an episode before the untimely event of her father’s passing when she is forgotten completely by him and he is enraged by her presence in his house. This came as a hook in the story of his mental health.
When her uncle suggests a trip to Paris and then a following visit to Antarctica, a place which she has become enticed by, and her mother is accidentally left behind, dark secrets become unveiled, strange quests for the centre of the world surface and emotions bubble, bringing the story to a tightened climax. Antarctica holds many new experiences and sinister ideas for the 14year old school girl.
Focusing mainly on the first part of “White Darkness”, you notice that the main aspect of the story is highlighted as Sym’s love for Titus, a 125 year old “ghost”, who died in 1912, at the age of 32, this is linked in with his significance and her “classmate’s” reactions to her “pretend friend”. This part is a part that most students can identify with, being an outsider within a group of people in school. The focus varies a lot during the beginning however does not ruin the overall effect of the story opening. Emotions run high in this opening, which adds to the small hook at the beginning of the story. She feels as if Titus is her soul mate and the taunts from the more “popular” girls in school made her believe in him even more, he was all she needed. I believe that this was true to life and showed that even the slightest things can set off stress, which is what may have caused her imagination to run wild in the first place. One harsh point that I did notice that was cold hearted and malicious was the comment that made her close in in the first place, after her father died, when Maxine said to Nats, “’ Don’t worry. I expect she just imagined it.’” Nevertheless, this was a god technique as it created sympathy for the main character and set the opinions in the reader’s mind that should have carried on throughout the book.
There are numerous ways of perceiving the main character. Is she a lonely child who just needs someone to talk to, someone who understands her? Has she merely been corrupted by her “uncle”, the man she believed really cared about her and her father, and felt that with the knowledge passed onto her from him could- in reality- create a friend for her? Or, is she simply mad? Of course, my explanation is that an imaginary friend has simply taken it’s time developing and, following the death of her father, she needed help from someone who, because he had all of her “under the surface emotions” , could tell her how she really felt. Although I did feel that Liz’s, from Amazon, comment before my own review wasn’t exactly right as I like to want to guess what will happen next but it wasn’t that interesting and Sym getting in a bit more trouble may have made that little bit more interesting.
Disregarding the main character’s occasional funny parts, for example: “We settled on killing Uncle Victor by brute force. With an ice axe.” She follows to almost plea for sympathy from the reader, “(I should say, in our defence, that we were very, very scared)”, this book, I felt, didn’t really hook me after I began to read it. The phrase “Don’t judge a book by its cover” springs to mind as I write this next comment as, you can probably guess, I did indeed do just that. The simple faces on the front and back cover of the book, partnered with the cold colours and intricate swirled patterns convinced me to pick up the book and read the blurb on the inside. I guess it is better to take a book and be let down than to avoid a book that looks dull and find out that you have missed out on something good because, at the end of the day, at least you’ve attempted it.
I felt that the hooks were few and far apart, and the storyline became less interesting as I read along. I believe that this book was not so awful that no- one should ever even consider reading it, however it is not a book that I would read again. With the serious and almost never ending plot, this book reminded me of a soap as it carried out the Uncle’s secret for too long and anyone in their right mind would have realised that something was not quite right in the first place. All I can say is that I hope that because of the ending being left open for questions, that wont mean a sequel.
Due to the lack of interest the storyline conjured up in my mind, however still remembering the occasional high points, I would give this book a two star rating and would only recommend this to someone who would read anything and everything.
YJL Yr9