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Junior fictions often depict characters responding to the challenge of difference or otherness in creative ways. Compare and contrast the narrative strategies used to represent challenge and difference in two of the books listed here.

Children’s literature encompasses an entire spectrum of books from various genres, ranging from picture books with arresting illustrations to fantasy novels with out-of-this-world depictions. Despite the many varieties of books however, most of them share certain characteristics, which aid the child in understanding the text and interpreting meaning from it. Children are usually the protagonists in the stories; the language used is constructed to suit its target audience and the conclusions are generally resolved strongly (Winters & Schmidt 10).

These characteristics are evident in the category of books that come under the genre of realistic fiction. Realistic fiction consists of plots that centre around “familiar, everyday problems, pleasures and personal relationships” (Norton 458). Unique in that it does not attempt to sugar-coat touchy issues, realistic fiction honestly tells it like it is, warts and all.

Books in this genre appeal to children as they can relate to the situations that the books’ protagonists face. The books reassure them that they are not the only ones in that particular situation. They also act as “both mirrors and windows of life” (Cullinan & Galda 222), as they not only make children think about their own situation, they also present alternative lifestyles that the children might not actually personally experience in real life.

Two examples of junior fiction books that have the protagonists deal with everyday problems faced by children are The Wacky World of Wesley Baker and Hannah plus One. Wesley has to deal with acting in the school play, avoiding Agnes Potter-Higgins, who constantly declares her love for him, and performing up to his father’s exceedingly high expectations. Hannah, meanwhile, worries that she will be lonely once her mother delivers the new baby.

While Hannah plus One may be aimed at a younger audience than The Wacky World of Wesley Baker, both books relate the plots chronologically. The stories are developed progressively over the chapters, with both protagonists facing various little obstacles along the way that they have to overcome.

Both feature person-against-person conflicts that are finally resolved at the end of the stories. Hannah has to come to terms with her family that the arrival of her new sibling will not translate into her being neglected by the other family members and Wesley has to prove to his father that he can in fact be good at sports.

The reader is aware of the thoughts and feeling of the two protagonists through two different points of view. (S)he is able to get an insight into the minds of the two protagonists and understand the motivations behind their actions and behaviours. In The Wacky World of Wesley Baker, the story is told with Wesley as the main focaliser. The first person narrative reduces the distance between the reader and Wesley, so that (s)he can easily identify with him. It draws the reader deep into the story as Wesley directly communicates with the reader through the narrative – “She blows kisses at me. Can you imagine it?” (Kemp 3). The reader is convinced that the story is really narrated from the point of view of a boy, especially when the word “Beeeooooootiful” (Kemp 95) is spelt like how a boy would say it.

Hannah plus One differs by being told through third person limited narration, where the “subjective viewpoint of the first person [combines] with the objective distance of the third person,” (Nodelman 59). Interestingly though, the first page of the book is presented from Hannah’s point of view in a first person narrative. The third person limited narration only officially starts from the tenth page, where the narrator begins to express the thoughts and feelings of Hannah occasionally – “Hannah stops. More twins. She hasn’t thought,” (Gleeson 10). It is obvious that the narrator is focalising through Hannah when the narrative appears to resemble Hannah’s thoughts – “Above her, her mother’s belly hangs like a great blue whale,” (Gleeson 21).

In general, the voice of The Wacky World of Wesley Baker is more informal and lighter than Hannah plus One. The first person narrative of Wesley is witty and sharp, with refreshing and honest insights into the life of an ordinary British schoolboy – “Mr le Tissier explained what a theme was and by the time he’d finished nobody knew” (Kemp 12). The light-hearted tone of the narrator (Wesley) reflects his easygoing nature, which in part helps him to overcome his problems. The third person limited narrative in Hannah plus One inhibits much emotional response from the reader to it, as it is rather detached. Thus, though Hannah’s problems are surmountable, they will not be solved as arrestingly as Wesley’s.

Yet, the two stories would be boring and incomplete without the assembly of secondary characters, who exist to frustrate, support and challenge Wesley and Hannah. Nodelman notes that theorists have categorised characters into being either flat or round. Flat characters are, like the name suggests, one-dimensional while the round ones have more depth and complexity to them – they develop as the story progresses (51).

The majority of the characters in the two books belong to the second category. They are “not all good, or all bad,” (Winter & Schmidt 232). The characters who initially seem to be antagonistic towards the two protagonists have their redeeming qualities while those on the protagonists’ side are not completely angels either.

An example would be Hannah’s older twin sisters, Lena and Sue. In the earlier chapters of the book, it appears that the only purpose they serve in the story is to bully Hannah and make her feel left out. They tease her mercilessly about the imaginary friend they think she has and use rulers to hit her shins. However, when she is sent to detention, they offer their support to her and even seem protective of her, whilst she remains unaware of the change in them – “She hasn’t noticed that her sisters are walking with her and not ten paces in front,” (Gleeson 37).

Meanwhile, Wesley’s relationship with his father is a big source of tension and frustration for him. His father refuses to acknowledge that Wesley is not athletically-inclined and constantly harangues him for his lack of talent thereof.

‘Well, Wesley, you won something,’ cried Dad, handing us our ribbon. ‘But what a disappointing day.’
‘Dad, Dad, I’m sorry,’ I managed to say to him (I was puffed out). ‘But Agnes has done brilliantly.’
'I know,’ he said. ‘She didn’t let me down,’ (Kemp 104).

But Wesley, being the dutiful son, never complains and just continues to bear with the physical trainings conducted by his father. It is only when Wesley is hospitalised that his father realises that things need to be changed.

Wesley’s conflict with Agnes Potter-Higgins is also resolved by the end of the story. His attitude towards her changes drastically from loathing to mutual respect as he realises that the two of them are more similar than he had previously thought. Initially, he uses negatives adjectives and verbs to express his distaste for her by describing her as “a pain in the neck” (Kemp 2) and calling her ‘Dinosaur’s Armpit’. But as he interacts with her more, he begins to understand her better and even grudgingly likes her company.

Angry at being always left out in the family, Hannah starts lashing out violently, hitting a classmate and bashing a sunflower. She attributes her violent tendencies to her alter-ego, Megan. Through Megan, Hannah is able to vent her frustrations and express herself in ways she would not dare to as Hannah. But the need for Megan soon reduces after Hannah realises that she can handle situations on her own. However, interestingly, Hannah names her newborn sister, Megan, so that she too will have a playmate of her own as “Hannah + Megan = 2,” (Gleeson 74).

Hannah interacts mainly with her parents and twin sisters, though a late development in the story results in her doing detention for hitting the above-mentioned classmate. She feels left out in the family, as her parents have each other, just like the twins. This distinct line of separation is especially evident between the twins and Hannah.

“Whenever Mum wipes the dust off the bookcase, she puts the photos back together, arranging the frames as if they were a pair. Before they go to bed at night, Lena, Sue and Hannah move the photos: twins at one end, Hannah at the other. An invisible line divides them, the same as the one which divides the books on the shelves below, the clothes in the hanging space in the wardrobe and the tennis racquets in the corner behind the door,” (Gleeson 50).

However, the three siblings finally manage to bond through Hannah’s adversity. The two elder twins offer advice to Hannah regarding her detention punishment and wait for her after the session.

These two stories offer an accurate and honest view of problems that could be faced by any reader. Through them, the reader is able to gain a better understanding about the problems (s)he faces and the methods of resolving them by seeing them “from a different, more mature, and more objective perspective” (Nodelman 22). While the problems may be explained through various narrative strategies, these strategies are only secondary to the most important thing in a book – the story that the author has to tell.

Bibliography
Cullinan, Bernice E., and Lee Galda 1994 Literature and the Child (3rd ed.). United States: Harcourt Brace College Publishers
Gleeson, Libby 1996 Hannah plus One. Australia: Puffin Books
Kemp, Gene 1994 The Wacky World of Wesley Baker. England: Penguin Group
Nodelman Perry 1991 ‘The Eye and the I: Identification and First-Person Narratives in Picture Books’. Children’s Literature 19: 1-30
Nodelman, Perry 1996 The Pleasures of Children’s Literature (2nd ed.). United States: Longman Publishers
Norton, Donna E. 1999 Through the Eyes of a Child: an Introduction to Children’s Literature (5th ed.). New Jersey: Prentice Hall, Inc
Winters, Carol J., and Gary D. Schmidt 2001 Edging the Boundaries of Children’s Literature. United States: Allyn and Bacon