It's an odd sensation, especially when you live in northern Canada, to catch yourself rooting for a mosquito.
Perhaps when you live in Prince George and the mosquito you're rooting for is named Prince George, and the places in which he's having his adventures are all around your familiar area, it might have an effect.
I'm sure when next spring arrives I will swat them as vigorously as ever, but I will surely think about each little one with a new sense of empathy. After reading The Meaning of Life According to the Mosquito, I feel like I've gotten to know some of them on a personal level.
The book is the first by Fraser Lake writer Debora Broadhead. It was officially launched in summer but only via online sales. Now copies are available on local bookshelves, just in time for stuffing Christmas stockings.
There are signs that this is a first effort - some clunky sentence structure, some issues with narrative pacing especially in the final third of the book - but this should give aspiring writers heart, that a first work can be a good read and worthy of bookstore shelves. This tale is aimed at tweens and teens, but I unabashedly enjoyed it with my adult sensibilities.
If anything, the publishing company could have stepped up the presentation much more, to keep pace with the peppy little story of a reluctant heir to the insect throne in a local swamp. The prince puts his parents' hopes for a coronation, and a royal wedding, on emotional hold while George and his two trusty friends buzz off to discover what they can about those thirsty feelings of wonderment about the world. It's the mosquito version of the stereotypical high school graduates heading off backpacking across foreign lands to "find themselves" before committing to the travails of life.
The story plays out like a movie, but the pictures in the mind are helped too little by Topaz Publishing, the company that pressed the book and made Broadhead into an author. The two inside illustrations were pitifully small considering the quality of the art, and there was room in the text for many images to tighten the book's grip on the reader.
Readers should be warned, though, that this is not a Disney story. More in the mould of the classic storytellers of literature, the path of this story is hardly all sugar and flowers. Broadhead bravely includes casualty in the conflict, and anguish alongside the joy and discovery.
She doesn't give it a supporting role, either, it comes right off the page and stabs your heart as distinctly as she makes you laugh and embrace this band of merry mosquitoes as they fly into uncharted territory.
Another major element I appreciated was the female dynamics within the characters and the plot. In Broadhead's story, women are soldiers, women are leaders, women have complex personality structures just like the male aspects of the tale. And just like real life. Should this ever be made into an animated film, it would stand out as a quality representation of gender reality compared to Hollywood's dubious representations of females in the history of animated films.
A warning is due for those sensitive to religious points of view. The Meaning of Life According to the Mosquito does not spend its time preaching, but there are brief moments where Christian beliefs take a front seat. It doesn't get in the way of telling the story or impinge on any family's overall belief system, in my view, so I recommend it to families of any faith. There is by far more allusion to Shakespearean and universal themes, than biblical ones.
For fans of royal families, medieval court tales recast in modern times, light romance and adventure stories, pleasant fantasy stories, this one is a treat. It is made special by the rare use of mosquito characters (I even learned a thing or two about nature and bug science) and the rare use of this region as a setting. Both were refreshing and noticeable factors in my enjoyment. The idea that someone out in the international world would be reading this book to their kids before bed, and subliminally learning about my region, gave me an extra smile as I eagerly turned the pages.
Until now, the book was available only in ebook form, or by special order from the United States, with a few copies in select local bookstores. It is now available in hardcopy form at all mainstream bookstores in Canada.
