Impossible Creatures by Katherine Rundell

Impossible Creatures takes readers on an unforgettable quest to re-enchant an imaginary world—that may not be as imaginary as it seems.

Impossible Creatures by Katherine Rundell. Knopf, 2024, 355 pages

Reading Level: Middle Grades, ages 10-12

Recommended for: ages 10-up

A holiday in the remote Scottish Highlands with a grandfather he barely knows has no appeal for Christopher, but when called away on business his father refuses to leave him alone in London. Grandfather Frank is the only alternative, but the holiday looks like a long stretch of boredom. Until the very next day, when an animal cry of distress draws Christopher to the lake at the top of the hill behind Frank’s cottage–where he was expressly forbidden to go. He has a natural affinity for creatures, and they for him, but he never expected to pull a baby griffin from the lake.

His grandfather reluctantly supplies an explanation:

There’s a secret place in our world—hidden from us, to keep it safe—where all the creatures of myth still live and thrive. The people who live there call it the Archipelago . . . It’s the last surviving magic place.

Grandfather guards the only gateway to the Archipelago, but something has gone awry for the griffin, and other mythical creatures, to escape. Next day Christopher encounters someone else who escaped: a human girl named Mal, desperate and shivering, fleeing from an assassin. Mal speaks the words that will change both her life and Christopher’s: “I need your help.” The magic that our world has lost is beginning to disappear from the Archipelago as well, and Mal is determined to discover why. She must go back, and if Christopher is destined to take his grandfather’s place as Guardian, he must go with her.

The quest to restore the magic, or glimourie, will grow to include a swashbuckling sea captain, a resolute scholar, sphinxes, centaurs, and ever higher stakes. Once the action is underway it never lets up, but there’s more to the story than action. Thrumming under the twists and turns is the wonder of life itself, a wonder so deeply rooted that humans “have forgotten that we have forgotten” it. That forgetting may eventually drain all meaning from the world and reduce life to a mere existence of power plays. The threat of chaos is ever hovering, but “greater than the world’s chaos are its miracles.”

Impossible Creatures is a deeply felt novel; one suspects it’s very close to the author’s heart. Is the transcendent wonder akin to God? There are a few passing mentions (as in, “God only knows”) and a reference to John Donne, a Christian poet whom Rundell has written about elsewhere. But the magic appears to have no source, and life remains a mystery: “There are no answers to being alive. There are only strong pieces of advice.” Still, this is a novel that rewards readers the more they think about it. There’s “strong advice” worth thinking about, such as, “stop expecting life to get easier. It never does; that’s not where its goodness lies.” And the essence is goodness.

Considerations:

• In the Bestiary at the end of the book, one Queen of a mythical species is said to have “married” a creature of the same sex.
• Though not graphic, the action and violence involved can be a bit too intense for sensitive readers.

Bottom Line: A beautifully-written adventure story with deep philosophical roots.

Also at Redeemed Reader:

• Reviews: Other books by Katherine Rundell are Into the Jungle (starred review), The Explorer, and The Good Thieves.
• Reflection: Where Does the Magic Come From?
• Reviews: Another quest story from an author who knows: The Wingfeather Saga (starred review)

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