What used to be local author Matthew Olshan?s bedtime story for his daughter may just turn out to be a best seller.
The Baltimore resident?s second novel, a young adult fantasy called “The Flown Sky,” will no doubt place Olshan?s name beside those of other great children?s writers like C.S. Lewis, Madeline L?Engle and Lewis Carroll.
“The Flown Sky” follows Eena, a fictitious creature called a Beena, which is a sort of primate with human abilities. Eena is perfectly content in her career as a beachcomber on Allele Island when the queen asks her to sacrifice everything in order to save the world. Along her adventure, readers meet a village of talking earwigs, an evil ape and one very intelligent gorilla.
Inspired by his captivation with “The Chronicles of Narnia” as a child, Olshan wanted to create a less exclusive world in his own book. Allele Island is a world where anyone can be royalty simply based on good and kindly behavior.
For those who search every piece of children?s literature for some sort of life lesson, Olshan weaves teamwork, selflessness, acceptance and, perhaps most significant, the importance of knowing and liking yourself enough to stand up for what you believe in into his novel.
And while other children?s writers seem content to write down to their readers, Olshan seemingly has as much confidence in his readers as he does in his intelligent and attractively modest heroine, Eena.
In a world where literature seems to be recycled repeatedly without a second thought, Olshan has brilliantly succeeded in inventing original ideas that will appeal to young adults as well as adults.
Don’t let the book?s nondescript cover fool you. An incredible journey awaits between its pages for both the characters and the readers.
AT A GLANCE
» The Flown Sky
» By Matthew Olshan
» Chacmool Press, Baltimore
» $19.95
» 340 pages
» www.theflownsky.com
