Crispin The Cross of Lead by Avi

Source of book: Audiobook from the Library

 

Since we listen to a lot of audiobooks during our road trips, I decided a few years back to use the Newbery Award list (including honor selections) for ideas for books I was not personally familiar with. This has been particularly useful for books published after the mid 1980s, since most of the contemporary ones were written after I stopped checking out children’s books from the library, and started on adult selections instead. Crispin the Cross of Lead won the Newbery in 2003.

 

I must say, I found this book to be a disappointment. Not only were the winners the year before (A Single Shard by Linda Sue Park) and after (The Case of Despereaux by Kate DiCamillo) FAR better books, the two runner-up books we have listened to were also a lot better. (A Corner of the Universe by Ann Martin and Hoot by Carl Hiaasen.) Oh well, win some, lose some. 

 

The problems with the book, as far as I am concerned, are several. But first, a summary. 

 

The book is set during the run up to the War of the Roses. Crispin grows up poor, to a single mother (his father has supposedly died in the plague), bullied for reasons he doesn’t understand, and becomes an outcast orphan after his mother dies. Chased by the steward of the estate he is bound to, he flees, meets a minstrel who takes him in as an assistant, comes to know of his birth - noble, of course - and has to figure out a way of not getting killed. 

 

So, there are some good moments. The minstrel, nicknamed “Bear” for his great size, is a fun character. As he is a heretical freethinker, he has the chance to address some of the theological beliefs of that time (and ours.) And occasionally, the period setting is portrayed in an illuminating manner.

 

But the problems. Yeesh. Okay, so first of all, I’m not sure the world really needed another “aristocrat discovers his true lineage” story in 2003. Occasionally, this kind of story is done well. (I remember liking Jeri Massi’s books as a kid - but the one involving the true commoner who becomes a Wise Woman is clearly the best of the series.) I guess maybe it is an American trait to fantasize about being an aristocrat in the past, but I find the idea kind of meh. Now, if Crispin had discovered he was the illegitimate child of a minstrel, well, that has some potential. 

 

The next issue is that the book tries to be both historically accurate, and yet highly implausible. I do not understand using a very specific historical setting, going to pains to get so many details right, and then ruining it at the end with one of the least plausible endings I have read. I mean, go with a straight up fantasy if you want. But don’t pretend that two people manage to use a combination of hostage taking and negotiation to escape an impossible situation. And don’t have someone seemingly miraculously recover from a near fatal beating. This is the sort of thing you expect in a spoof like the wonderful The Princess Bride, right? But not in a book that has striven for accuracy before that. 

 

I also found it disappointing that a book published in 2003 had a sum total of one supporting character who was female. Really? You have over six hours of audiobook, and the female innkeeper is all you can come up with? Everyone else is male? 

 

So yeah, too many disappointments to make this book worth recommending. Ron Keith does a good job narrating it, but there is only so much one can do with a story that just isn’t compelling.