"Mr. Lewis said something like this about imagination.' I stop and think back; I don’t want to misquote him. “‘Whenever you are fed up with life, start writing: ink is the great cure for all human ills’” (Galley Kindle location 580).
Once upon a
wardrobe, not very long ago and not very far away, a middle-aged girl, weighed
down by the death, disease, disaster, and dissension screaming from the
headlines, opened an email from a book review site. She had resolved not to
agree to any more review books at present, but there it was: the cover artwork showing
the dreaming spires of Oxford at blue hour, a Narnian lamppost garlanded with
fresh snow in the foreground, the fairy-tale title Once Upon a Wardrobe, and a tiny lion’s head like a door-knocker inviting
her into whatever adventure Aslan might have within. Resolve crumbled in the
face of such a summons.
“Yes, please and
thank you,” she clicked.
When the galley eBook
arrived in her inbox, she dropped everything to begin reading. As surely as
Alice fell into Wonderland or Harry fell into Dumbledore’s Pensieve, she
promptly fell into this tale of Oxford don C. S. Lewis helping a brother and
sister learn to live in love, grief, and hope, all bound up together. The story
raised the hair on the reader’s arms in prickles of wonder, brought a chuckle
to her throat and a smile to her face, and repeatedly reduced her to tears as
she read her Kindle in the backyard pool. It gave the sheerest, purest delight
she’d felt in many weeks.
“George knows you can take the bad parts in a life, all the hard and dismal parts, and turn them into something of beauty. You can take what hurts and aches and perform magic with it so it becomes something else, something that never would have been, except you make it so with your spells and stories and with your life.” (Kindle 2306).
In Once Upon a Wardrobe by Patti Callahan
Henry (Harper Muse, October 19, 2021), Megs Devonshire studies mathematics at Oxford and dreams of one day
becoming a professor and unraveling the mysteries of the universe through logic
and mathematical reasoning. She remains aloof from the exuberant social life of
her peers, however, spending most weekends traveling to and from her home
village. You see, her beloved brother, George, is dying of a heart condition
and unlikely to see his ninth birthday. He has developed an obsession with the
recently published children’s book TheLion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, by C. S. Lewis, and he knows Lewis
happens to be a tutor at the university his sister attends. His dying wish is
to find out from Mr. Lewis where Narnia comes from, where all the stories and
places in his book come from.
His sister
resists at first. It seems romantic nonsense to her mathematical self. After
all, Mr. Lewis is quite famous and teaching in one of the Oxford colleges where
no girls are allowed in the 1950s, so how on earth is she to meet him and ask
her brother’s questions? She even considers making an answer up and lying to
her brother about having done his bidding, but ultimately she can’t bring
herself to do that. She devises a plan to try to meet Lewis at his home, and
while she sits outside screwing her courage to the sticking place, Lewis’s
brother Warnie discovers her and invites her inside the home he shares with
“Jack” for tea.
The many lengthy
conversations that ensue don’t exactly answer George’s questions, and yet they
do. In the process, Megs has her own ideas turned upside-down: ideas about
imagination, reason, and whether a made-up story can, even so, tell the truth
in a way a mathematical equation cannot. She finds friendship, mentorship,
love, and the surprise of joy along the way. The world-weary girl reading her
adventures discovers the closest thing she’s ever experienced to a second first
time entering Narnia, and the nearest thing to tea with Jack and Warnie at theKilns.
“'Have you felt it, sister? Have you felt that joy?' I want to answer him. I close my eyes. 'I think so. When I solve a problem or equation that seems impossible, it’s like there’s some kind of light breaking through, or the knowing leads to some kind of satisfaction . . . and maybe joy. Or when I walk outside on a spring afternoon and the first crocus is born from the snow and the sunlight runs across the spider webs like messengers from tree to tree, that’s when I remember something, something I’ve forgotten and is waiting for me, something . . . larger than me. And then it’s gone. And I want it back. I think that’s what Mr. Lewis is talking about.' 'Like when you finish a story and you wish you could read it like you’d never read it before. Like you want to read it for the first time again,' George says" (Kindle 1235).
Readers familiar
with the non-fiction work of C. S. Lewis may experience some déjà -vu, as many
of the facts incorporated into the story appear in Surprised by Joy. Ideas from his literary criticism, Mere Christianity, Weight of Glory, The FourLoves, and his letters to children also make their presence known. Even so,
the whole far exceeds the sum of its parts. Ms. Callahan has clearly dwelt with
her extensive research to the point that the ideas come out as if they were her
own.
Readers not
familiar with the life of Lewis and his non-fiction work will likely find this
an accessible and delightful point of entry. The bibliography was not yet ready
in the galley copy I enjoyed, but I expect that it will point readers in the
right direction if they wish to read more. If readers of this new book have not yet read The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe, I would suggest reading that first, or at least pausing to read it when Megs does in the newer book.
Warning: common
side effects of this book include impulsive binge-reading of the Narnian
stories and other Lewis works. And those of George MacDonald. And a blown book
budget.
All in all, Once Upon a Wardrobe earns my most
heartfelt and earnest recommendation. The way it braids love, grief, and hope
together is magical and healing. It overflows with another of Lewis’s favorite
ideas, Sehnsucht, that homesick
longing that Lewis considered to be proof we were made for another world. The
story works as story, but also explores the mystery of what can only be understood through imagination, the paradox that fiction (or “myth”) can convey some truths in
a way nothing factual can, and the narrative escape that—at its best—is not
escapist but equips the reader to return to life outside of the book we’re
reading.
Once upon a
wardrobe, not very long ago and not very far away, a world-weary middle-aged
girl found deep and needed soul refreshment in this winsome story about sibling
love, friendship, and the marvelous mystery of great books. She hopes you read
it too.
(Also? Patti Callahan, I hear you. I hear you.)
**********
To purchase this
book, scheduled for release on October 19, 2021:
https://amzn.to/3tzQjvz (affiliate link)
https://fabledbookshop.com/item/EC6yEHJbaSFFq4f-COrpqg (Fabled Bookstore in Waco, Texas)
https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/once-upon-a-wardrobe-patti-callahan/1138845918?ean=9780785251729
Also by Patti
Callahan Henry:
Becoming Mrs. Lewis, a biographical novel about Joy Gresham
Lewis (affiliate link)
{All of the Amazon links herein are affiliate links. This author will receive a few pence per purchase made through them.)
