Author JONATHAN NAUMAN
Publisher FRIENDSHIP FARM PRESS WISCONSIN
There is no ISBN for this book and it is only available direct from the publisher in
Wisconsin but for those who want a good storybook with hidden meanings, somewhat
in the tradition of Madeleine L’Engle it would be worthwhile making the effort to
get a copy for their teenage children and the parents themselves would be helped by
reading too. The tale concerns three sixth grade boys and although there is adventure
in the story there is mystery too. Younger readers will have their imaginations stirred
as they follow the fascinating unfolding of dream and real events that link with things
that took place in the past also. Jim Canby and Alan Prince react to these unfolding
events in different ways. In the end Alan, encouraged by his parents psychologizes
and explains away the extraordinary and the mysterious whilst Jim follows through
the both with mind and heart right through to the end and in pursuing this course was
enlarged in understanding in ways his peer was not. The subtitle informs us that this
is a “late-summer night’s dream” and it is indeed that for it has a dream-like quality
all the way through though it also possesses those elements that grips the reader and
draws them on to find out the next installment in the adventures of these young boys.
There are other values implicit in the story, the connections of present events with
those of the past and the happy relationships that should pertain between those who
are old with the young and the young with those much older than them for example.
I think that this could be a good book for parents and children to read together and
although it is not expressly Christian there are spiritual lessons that can be helpfully
drawn from it.
