Beyond World's End

by Nina Beachcroft

Chris and Jane, whose friendship is new and uneasy, find an entrance to another world where their help is enlisted to free a girl bound in endless sleep by the dreaded Kraken.

Genres: Childrens

139 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1985

Reviews

[Capn · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of those books which is very hard to accurately review without spoiling the entire plot....

Here's the Google Books summary:

Chris and Jane, whose friendship is new and uneasy, find an entrance to another world where their help is enlisted to free a girl bound in endless sleep by the dreaded Kraken.

And here's the back jacket from my Dragon Books edition:

Chris wondered whether he was dreaming. Through the hole in the wall, from the mysterious house, even the view was wrong. You could see the sea, but Chris knew that the sea was hundred of miles away.
He needed someone else to go back with him. And the only person around was unfriendly, posh Jane Mackintosh. Could he persuade her to come with him? And would they find out who the strange people in that house were, and why they needed his help?

Here is a short book (this edition has 123 pages - ISBN 0583307582) that packs a serious punch. The cover of mine is inscrutable, or at least confusing: a ring of blue irises around a rearing, shouting (?!) blue grey dragon bust, a full moon, splashes of water (..I think?!), and a red UFO of the 'flying saucer' variety, with two auburned-haired tots (look like six year olds - much younger than Chris and Jane are meant to be!) facing a glowing sword, mouths agape in shock, in the foreground. Also, little blue birds and these flying eels or lampreys or something. (Don't you just HATE it when the cover art is misrepresentative?!). I added an image of this cover to my profile photos, with all the relevant info (incl. cover artist citation), if someone would like to officially upload it. ;)

Ignore this cover art. In fact, forget the summaries, too. All of it. To be honest, the flying saucer alone would have put me off (the only sci-fi I really go for is ST:TNG, and only then in limited courses). Also, there's no dragons. They exist, in the Goblin Universe, but neither protagonist has any dealings with them. The Kraken, however, does play a fairly central role - goodness knows why they didn't depict that! Maybe they didn't want to scare off the young audience, I don't know. But it was a moronic decision. ;) The summary on the backcover is misleading as well: the view of the sea isn't from inside the house - Chris sees it while climbing. And he doesn't 'need' anyone else to come with him - he is commanded to, and is put under a spell which forces him to comply. He actually has to find someone of the opposite gender and of the same approximate age to bring with him, and he is compelled to use subterfuge and manipulation to do so... it's a little dark, and in all the right ways. There's discussion, later, between Chris and Jane (Jane being clever but socially flawed - an interesting character!) that I found captivating, where they discuss motivations of the others, and touch on some profound considerations on the basis of morality and humanity. It never gets bogged down, though.

I'm struggling to write a decent review of this, because as I mentioned, it would spoil so much. I'll take the easy way out and do some bullet points:
- there's a flying saucer, and a brief discussion about the movie E.T. (this book published in 1985!)
- there's the Goblin Universe, the parallel world to our own, where the fairies, elves, etc. live
- there's an archaeological dig (Iron-Age) on 'No Man's Common' (not much detail of that, sadly)
- there's some mild ESP or psychic ability, and it's delightfully credible rather than obnoxiously far-fetched
- the characters are great - Beachcroft is excellent this way - and I loved the realistic relationship between Chris and bossy Jane, Chris's quick-tempered but independent grandmother, and his young uncle Ben who is an atypical hybrid of older brother and ersatz father (again, I highly recommend A Visit to Folly Castle as well - different characters, different story, but interesting characters, realistic social outcomes, complex situations)
- there are plot red-herrings, in a way: unlikeable anti-hero/antagonist stays as garden-variety, unlikeable personality and doesn't turn out to be a secondary villain or a link to the other world. Delightful, because I rather expected this to turn out differently
- there's some foreshadowed tragedy
- not everything has been explained, but enough has - it opens the door to endless speculation, both about what occurred and why, what's happening now, and, best of all, every unexplained event on our planet and in our mythology.
- touches on the nature of evil, and on how humanity would appear to an extraterrestrial race, morally and physically - would their caricatures of us hurt our feelings? There's more philosophy about a reflection in the mirror (is it you? What if it isn't? How do we see ourselves?). Also pauses to consider what it would be like for someone who has had a 'close encounter of the third kind', for real, and how horribly isolating it must be to never speak of it or never be believed when you do
- the Kraken is properly terrifying, but also quite strange - apparently it is happy to follow rivers upstream and to lurk in fresh water lakes, if so inclined, and is spider-like in its feeding habits.

This is one of those stories that expands the worldview of a child, inviting in a grand unifying theory of all folklore and mythology, ancient and modern, while also raising self-reflective questions of the individual and the society. And it's all open-ended; no dogma here.

This is my third Nina Beachcroft book, and I think it's perhaps the best so far (the others, Well Met By Witchlight & A Visit to Folly Castle, were excellent, especially A Visit to Folly Castle). I think she's a forgotten and overlooked author that really deserves more readership. We've discussed this author in the group Forgotten Vintage Children's Lit We Want Republished!: https://www.goodreads.com/topic/show/... - please come by and share your enthusiasm for the out-of-print gems that have wrongly fallen off our collective radar. :)

THIS TITLE IS AVAILABLE TO BORROW FOR FREE FROM OPEN LIBRARY.
I don't think I realised that when I bought a hardcopy, but I'm so glad I did (I might even buy EDIT: I just bought another for my nieces and nephews - this is a great read, and one that should be readily available even during screen-free hours):
https://openlibrary.org/authors/OL170...,
link to Beyond the World's End: https://openlibrary.org/works/OL64454...

I hoped to write a useful review, but again, because of the nature of the story, I'm struggling to give info without undermining the foundations of this story. If you have any questions or comments, or would like to know something more, please reach out and I'll be happy to help. :) But you should also know that you can search by keyword in a borrowed OpenLibrary or Archive.org book, which is game-changing. ;)

OH - you might wish to have some Smarties on hand for mid-book snacking. ;) I'll mention it in the 'A Book and a Related Gift Guide' group: https://www.goodreads.com/group/show/...

[Cheryl · Rating 3 out of 5]

Openlibrary.org. Maybe because I read it as a scanned ebook I didn't fully appreciate it. I might have loved it as a child. It's a charming adventure, a mix of fantasy & SF, with some heart, some insight... but not quite wonderful.