The list of books that made me cry as a child (thus cementing their places in my all-time favorites, because: obviously) is not an exceptionally long one, but it is headed off by an exceptional book: Tuck Everlasting. Other books may have been first to make Itty Bitty Misty ugly-cry — that distinction probably goes to one of a number of books where one of the main characters was an animal, which made you love it and then died, nobly, because always, always, why do they do that?! — but there are two books that stand in my memory as books to make me cry for all the right reasons; to make me connect with the characters and feel for the things they went through, not in a false, pulling-your-readerly-strings way, but in an honest, pure, really-good-story-well-told way, and those two books are Tuck Everlasting and The Bridge to Terabithia. Man, they just killed my 9 year old self. (Well, that seems like a poor choice of words, all things considered, but you know.) And these are books which have stuck with me in the long years since. Books I've come to appreciate even more as an adult, and whose authors I've come to respect for the work they did in the stories they told.
Needless to say, I'm very happy to be taking part in the discussions around the 40th anniversary of Natalie Babbitt's amazing classic, Tuck Everlasting, and I can't wait to hear your thoughts on the book and on all of this VER SRS STUFF in the comments! ^_^
(But seriously, thanks for joining me for this Serious Misty moment, and thanks, of course, for watching!)
So, VER SRS MS.T has one question for your VER SRS selves: would you drink from the Spring. and what would you do with your endless life if you did?
(Okay, so it's a two-part question — still one question.)
Chat with me about it in the comments, and follow along on the rest of the Tuck Everlasting Anniversary tour on social media with the hashtag #Tuck40TH!
TUCK EVERLASTING by Natalie Babbitt:
Get the 40th Anniversary Edition
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Doomed to—or blessed with—eternal life after drinking from a magic spring, the Tuck family wanders about trying to live as inconspicuously and comfortably as they can. When ten-year-old Winnie Foster stumbles on their secret, the Tucks take her home and explain why living forever at one age is less a blessing that it might seem. Complications arise when Winnie is followed by a stranger who wants to market the spring water for a fortune.
Nope, I wouldn't be touching that spring with a ten-foot pole. Living forever and watching everyone you care about die (as they age and you do not) strikes me as being an incredibly lonely and depressing existence. I read Tuck Everlasting in Grade 6 and honestly, I found it downright unsettling... I have to wonder if as an adult I would have a different reaction, but as a kid the whole concept of the Tucks' everlasting life kind of creeped me out. I suspect the whole rock-or-a-hard-place choice Winnie faces also bothered me — when I was younger I was a lot less fond of ambiguity or bittersweetness in the books I read, lol XD
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