The Selected Works of T S Spivet
by Reif Larsen

Release Date: 7th May 2009
Publisher: Harville Secker
ISBN: 978 1 8465 5277 9
RRP: £17.99

Average Customer Rating:

(0.0 based on 0 ratings)

Science can be interesting, if not cool...

The Selected Works of T. S. Spivet is the brainchild of previously unpublished and complete unknown, Reif Larsen and is an elaborately told, illustrated and imagined story of a 12-year-old boy raised on a ranch in Montana who has a phenomenal skill in cartography. With the normal dysfunctional family around him, perhaps what sets him apart is the fact that his brother, Layton, died at a tender age – and in his presence – with a Winchester shot gun. How this affects T. S is a bit of mystery as he refers to the incident almost offhandedly, even going so far as to say that he felt Layton would have liked being drawn by the Coroner as a face with a bullet hole through his forehead. Suffice it to say that T. S is no ordinary 12-year-old boy.

The plot itself is autobiographical in a one sense; scientific data dissemination is another. It is by contrasts light and dark, benign and unsettling, utterly captivating and yet dull. There is such a depth of information contained in its pages; it is any wonder that any binding can carry it all. What is uniquely brilliant about this book is also self-confessed to be a “rip-off” of Darwin’s own notebooks – littered seemingly at random, and yet very much an integral part of the book itself, are various illustrations, maps, diagrams and data sets – all meticulously drawn and imparted with such a ferocity of feeling that you realise with some degree of certainty that the author is a nerd.

Consider this though: that perhaps some of the greatest literary offerings have all sprung from that intellectual bottomless pit that is the nerd. Nerds, it seems, are both more than capable of creating masterpieces, but also of speaking to a generation in a unique and highly original manner. The story may be about a 12-year-old, but there is no doubt that it is aimed directly at the adult market, the technical language and complexities in which T. S surrounds and immerses himself in have no real place in the minds of young children – or perhaps the point is that they do. Perhaps the point is that child prodigies should be actively encouraged and sought-out. Perhaps the nerd in Larsen also wants to expound the untold wealth of immeasurable variables and exciting possibilities that having a scientific outlook of the world offers our human minds – both young and old. Whatever the author’s intentions, it will probably not have come as a shock that he has created an evocative debut novel that has sent the benchmark extremely high for any successive novel.

A minor side point: would that publishers would leave a good book cover alone. The proof copy’s covering was much more imaginative and expressive; the new hardback version is too bland by comparison and does the book itself no favours.

Your Reviews:

Click here to login or register and leave your very own review of The Selected Works of T S Spivet

Be the first to leave your own review of The Selected Works of T S Spivet!