Synopses & Reviews
Haunting and deeply moving a beautifully illustrated, fictionalized account of a formative time in the life of the teenage girl who wrote our most enduring horror story.
Long before Mary Shelley published her Gothic masterpiece, Frankenstein, in 1818, at the age of nineteen, she shared fireside ghost tales at the home of family friends in Scotland. It was there that the headstrong girl orphaned by her mother, spurned by her stepmother, and sent away by her father spent two of her happiest teenage years. The brooding Scottish landscape and warm family atmosphere so influenced the author's life and art that some believe her famous novel took root there.
To illuminate this period in Mary Shelley's life, Sharon Darrow skillfully spins fiction from fact. Her words are masterfully matched by Angela Barrett's exquisite, atmospheric, authentically detailed illustrations. The result is a rich tapestry of stories within stories those told, those written, and more extraordinary, those lived.
Review
"The teenage trauma is dramatic, and Barrett's beautiful watercolors set the archetypal outsider story against wild, dark views of the Scottish landscape." Booklist
Review
"This beautiful book delivers a smidgen of information, some conjecture, and an emotional peek into the life of a fascinating 19th-century writer." School Library Journal
Synopsis
This engaging storybook presents a haunting, deeply moving fictionalized account of a formative time in the life of Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley, the teenage girl who wrote the Gothic masterpiece Frankenstein.
Synopsis
Haunting and deeply moving - a beautifully illustrated, fictionalized account of a formative time in the life of the teenage girl who wrote our most enduring horror story.Long before Mary Shelley published her Gothic masterpiece, Frankenstein, in 1818, at the age of nineteen, she shared fireside ghost tales at the home of family friends in Scotland. It was there that the headstrong girl - orphaned by her mother, spurned by her stepmother, and sent away by her father - spent two of her happiest teenage years. The brooding Scottish landscape and warm family atmosphere so influenced the authors life and art that some believe her famous novel took root there. To illuminate this period in Mary Shelleys life, Sharon Darrow skillfully spins fiction from fact. Her words are masterfully matched by Angela Barretts exquisite, atmospheric, authentically detailed illustrations. The result is a rich tapestry of stories within stories - those told, those written, and more extraordinary, those lived.
About the Author
Sharon Darrow, when asked why she chose to write about Mary Shelley, explains how much her life and Marys intersect emotionally. "We share a concern about the effects of new technologies on our hearts, minds, and lives," she explains. "We are both preoccupied by the complexity of parent-child relationships, and we have both made choices that were difficult but personally necessary." THROUGH THE TEMPESTS DARK AND WILD is Sharon Darrows first book with Candlewick Press. She lives in Chicago with her two cats and teaches in Vermont Colleges M.F.A. in Writing for Children program.
Angela Barrett is the award-winning illustrator of many books for children, including THE EMPEROR'S NEW CLOTHES and ROCKING HORSE LAND AND OTHER CLASSIC TALES OF DOLLS AND TOYS, both retold by Naomi Lewis. Of what drew her to this story, she says, "First, Mary grew to maturity during a time period in which everything - the writers and artists, the social developments, the wars, the houses and fashions and all the trappings - has long interested me. Second, Marys dark romantic imagination appealed to me. What dreams she must have had!"