Make the Light Last

 A question lots of people seem to want an answer to is, "What makes a great book?"

 Well, it has to fascinate the reader, draw him in, so he reads pages without noticing the clock ticking away. He has to finish the book and wish there was more, while also feeling fulfilled by the end of the story arc. There are lots of things, and they're different for each of us, aren't they? One man's meat is another man's poison. I know many people loved "The da Vinci Code", but I thought it was dull and predictable.

 So the question is meaningless, really. But it can have relevance for an individual.

 Myself, I like "The Lions of al-Rassan", by Guy Gavriel Kay. It's a story set against hatred and coming war, but deals with people who find friendship and love across those dividing lines. It's simultaneously filled with hope and terrible sadness, a grief I felt physically when I re-read the book (for the fifth or sixth time) last week. Kay's novel "Tigana" is excellent too, but not as layered, I think.

 Sheri S Tepper has produced several books that I go back to again and again. "Grass" and "Sideshow" are two of them. The one I iike best though is "The Awakeners", which is about a world of humans and a flying species called the Thraish, living in an uneasy peace after a war long ago. Neither side likes the peace and some people are working to end it, on both sides. There are monstrous secrets, too; the novel is largely a shouted warning against religious extremism. Again it's sad and hopeful at the same time, but here the hope is stronger.

 "It", by Stephen King, is the most brilliant evocation of childhood I've ever read. The recent film is very good, but the book is a hundred times better, full of the aches and uncertainties of the time just before puberty. I've read it ten times or more and it still has the power to unsettle. When we're speaking of great books, isn't that key? The ability to cause an emotional reaction years after it was first read is priceless. Wish I had a tenth of that ability.

This isn't an exhaustive list, but three is enough for now. The books are different but share some themes, notably sadness and joy running side by side. In all of them people have to learn how to make the light last through their dark times. It's a struggle I've had in the past, which is probably why I react to these novels the way I do. Like I said, it's different for each of us, isn't it?

 Writing changes lives. It changes you and me, and it can change a whole culture, on occasion. Or create one, as Tolkien did. Me, I'm just telling stories, and that's enough.

 Pip pip.