The Atheneum

(Hardback)

Publishing Details

Classifications

Physical Properties

Description

Age range 6 to 9

In the Atheneum, everyone has an adventure waiting.

And so when young Jack, voiceless, alone and lost in a storm, seeks shelter there one night, he finds himself wandering its winding corridors under the guidance of a mysterious old man who has made a most peculiar offer: Jack must find a voice of his own among the dusty old books that line its endless shelves. But sooner than he'd imagine, he slips into somewhere farther than he's ever been from home but closer than he's ever been to where he should be.

Reviews

"...at its best, lucid and unassuming writing delivers thoughtful, intelligent content is ultimately the purpose of reading. This is what Trevor Newland does in The Atheneum, a stylishly illustrated and extraordinarily intelligent work of Children's Literature that really is, as the biographical page indicates, a story "for young AND old people. . . . All of this is to say that if I were a young reader I'd be drawn to Newland's enigmatic illustrations because they communicate the power of the written word--and drawn picture--to transport us, by the seeming magic medium of reading, to an unbounded world of the imagination. Isn't that exactly what younger readers crave . . . I'm an older reader, however, and what I found remarkable about The Atheneum is the simple premise underlying Jack's quest, which is that our sense of identity--our "voice"--is not something inside of us just waiting to be released but is to a great extent the effect of reading." -- Peter Babiak, The British Columbia Review

Author Bio

Trevor Newland is an author and illustrator of stories for young AND old people. He has been a professional musician and songwriter, and he has published fiction for adults. Currently, he teaches literature and creative writing at Langara College in Vancouver. This is his fourth book, and it was inspired by countless classic adventure stories he read as a youth. The young hero of this adventure is Jack, inspired by Trevor's own son (who also loves to read), and Trevor hopes that Jack (as well as YOU) will find the same inspiration in these classic tales of high adventure. Remember, all you need to fly through the air on a cannon ball, to be sneezed out of a whale, to come face-to-face with a raging hound on the moors, or to visit a mad tea party is to pick up a good book.