Penelop and the sparkling red magic

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Penelop and the Sparkling Red Magic is the second novel by the German author Valija Zinck . It was illustrated by Annabelle von Sperber with 42 vignettes that are attached to each chapter at the beginning. It was published in 2017 in the children's book program Fischer KJB by S. Fischer Verlag .

The children's and young people's book contains elements of the fantastic in that the protagonists develop supernatural abilities, inexplicable things happen, but the narrative otherwise follows a realistic depiction of Penelop's life, such as school attendance, homework and meeting her friends. The period from the beginning of April to August 13th, Penelop's eleventh birthday, is described.

action

Penelop Gowinder is described as a strange girl with lead gray hair, a clinging smell of fire and the ability to hear sentences before the other person speaks them. Always on August 13th, her birthday, it rains without the rain making her wet. She grows up with her mother Lucia, who works as a clarinetist at the theater, and grandmother Erlinda in a "small, somewhat draughty wooden house on the outskirts, right next to the swamp forests". The gray cat Cucuu, her father's late deceased, also lives in the house.

At the beginning of April, Penelop's mother was hit by a tractor and had to spend several weeks in the hospital. On the day of her release, Penelop wakes up on Saturday with curly red hair, no smell of fire, but a new feeling of alertness and strength. She also receives a letter from L. Gowinder , who is unknown to her, containing only a bank note. Her grandmother reacts to her red hair with horror. When she tries to cut it off, Penelop fled indignantly into the forest until evening. She has already gone to bed when her grandmother returns home with her mother. She tries to coat the hair of the supposedly sleeping Penelop with a gray color paste that smells of fire, like all the years before. When confronted by Penelop, her mother confesses that her father did not die. She tells how she fell in love with a young, red-haired man named Leopold Gowinder with supernatural abilities. One day he did not return from his sporadic meetings with "his own kind", full of energy and happy, but worried and dyed his hair lead gray to "make himself invisible to his own kind". He and Lucia moved into the little house and lived undisturbed for the time being. After Penelop's birth, Leopold rarely did without the color paste in order to try out new magic. On one of those days he did not return from his excursion. After a few months, Lucia received a suicide note that he had left her in order to be able to live again as a magician and with another woman. Since then, on the 7th of each month, she has received an envelope with money to support the child by post. Fearing that she would lose Penelop too, she began to bleach her hair with the paste that was still there.

On Sunday morning Penelop saw the dark green tractor fetching bread rolls. “Like me, like me” runs through your head, before the latter tries to run over you, but loses the path from a sudden bump in the road and races off. After initial shock, Penelop realizes that the street has come to life, saved her life and even speaks to her. With the guidance of the speaking street, Penelop even manages to float. On Monday morning, Penelop's classmates admired their new hair color. Her classmate Pietsch tells her, confused, that the day before he suddenly heard two voices in his head. The first kindly asked that Cuccuu be brought to Schwarzpfuhl, the second mentioned the name Gowinder and was cold and unfriendly. In the next few weeks Penelop does not go swimming with the other children as usual, but secretly practices floating, frustrated by the fact that she cannot reach any great height. Only later at the lake does it suddenly succeed, but she injures herself when hitting a pine branch. In the evening, her grandmother hands her a book written by “Alpha Regius” and owned by Leopold, which might be useful to her, “now that you are one of them”. With the help of the book, she successfully masters flying. The next day, her mother supposedly received another gray envelope from Leopold, this time only containing sand and feathers. At the weekend, Penelop goes to town with school friends Tom and Pietsch. When Penelop later goes shopping, she meets the girl Gina, whom she recognizes as “her own kind”. She tells her about Alpha Regius training courses and gives her an "Anti-Eye" that can make you invisible for ten seconds. Pietsch's father tells on the way back that his construction machinery company is doing worse and worse, without knowing why.

The following weeks pass with Penelop practicing her new skills and planning a trip to Schwarzpfuhl, where she suspects her father to confront him. The opportunity comes when her mother takes grandmother Erlinda to a cure in early July. As soon as both have left, Penelop dyes her hair lead gray again with the paste from her mother's closet so that it is not visible to her father, and suddenly feels "heavy and plump and dull". After that, she colors the hair with previously purchased brown paint so as not to attract attention. She packs the “anti-eye” and a 19-meter-long creeping tuber root, an annoying weed that she and her grandmother had previously removed from the garden. Early the next morning on July 5th, she takes the train to Schwarzpfuhl, tapes up the openings in the public mailboxes and positions herself at the post office to intercept her father dropping the monthly letter. Around noon a man appears with a dark gray envelope in hand, whom she identifies as “her own kind”. She follows him to the post office and finds out that it is not her father who writes the mean letters, but the man named Fellseifer, with “narrow eyes that were gray and cold like dead fish.” She follows him and feels the presence of a second person in the house who she recognizes as her father. It is impossible for her to fly over the wall, but when the large gate in front of the house opens and the tractor she is familiar with drives in, she can slip in behind him unnoticed. She hears in horror how Serge, the driver of the tractor, mocks her father, who is being held captive in an underground dungeon in the garden, which is closed with a heavy iron hatch. When he leaves, she can talk to her father and throw the "anti-eye" down through a crack. When Fellseifer comes to the hatch with some food, he notices the supposed absence of Penelop's father, who is now invisible. As he runs away to fetch reinforcements, Penelop throws down the tuberous tendril that the ragged and weakened Leopold climbs up. Together they can escape from the property and just barely reach the afternoon train.

Leopold fears that his tormentors might track him down in the next few days, but trusts his cat Cucuu, whom he had charged with his strength. He says that he did not leave Penelop and Lucia at that time, but that Fellseifer and his cronies kidnapped him, thrown him into the dungeon and shaved his head so that he lost his strength. They only let his hair grow so long that he was forced to do jobs for which their own abilities were insufficient and which were intended to make them money. This solves the mystery of the inexplicable money problems in Pietsch Vater's construction machinery company. Just before they get home, Penelop senses that Fellseifer and Serge are already there. Nevertheless, she tries to get Cucuu, but is noticed by the two of them and escapes into the swamp forest. Thanks to her ability to fly, she glides just above the swamp as her pursuers sink in behind her. Leopold, who in the meantime has regained his strength through contact with Cucuu, casts a forgetting spell about both of them, who from then on consider themselves to be American tourists on vacation in Europe. In the evening, Penelop tells her returning mother about the kidnapping and return of Leopold before she lets the stunned Lucia enter the house. On August 13th, Penelop's 11th birthday, it was not raining for the first time. She celebrates with Lucia, Leopold and her grandmother. In the afternoon she has a visit from Gina, Tom and Pietsch. In the evening she falls asleep happily thinking that she has her family, flying, the road and her friends and doesn't want to swap places with anyone.

Awards

In 2017, Penelop and the sparkling red magic were nominated for the Zurich Children's Book Prize as well as the Ulmer Unke in the age category 10–12 years and the Golden Book Pirate for 2017. The book was recommended by the Reading Foundation and is listed by Antolin .

The audio book of the same name was awarded the Auditorix audio book seal by the Hören Initiative , the State Agency for Media North Rhine-Westphalia and the Art, Culture and Social Foundation of Sparda-Bank West in 2017 .

reception

Verena Hoenig judges in the Süddeutsche Zeitung that it is an "exciting witch novel in which the word" witch "never appears." The Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger is of the opinion that Valija Zinck has "a magical one with Penelop and the sparkling red magic. " Book written about the strength of children. The little leading actress encourages everyone not to lose their curiosity. ”The Reading Foundation and Karin Steinfeld-Bartelt from the Borromäusverein agree :“ The exciting novel skilfully balances adventure, fantasy and family history! The characters are drawn in an original way, [...] and the heroine finds her own, very special identity - understandable for young readers - "which accepts her magical otherness and sees it as an opportunity."

Verena Hoenig continues: “The scene in which the girl tries to tell her father in a torrent of words everything that she has experienced, recognized, thought and felt over the past ten years is very touching.” Based on Christine Nöstlingers Die feuerrote Friederike , "the author chose the landscapes and villages of the Uckermark as a backdrop , she tells in dense, poetic language about the meadows and forests that inspired her."

expenditure

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Penelop and the Sparkling Red Charm . Pp. 7-9
  2. ↑ Penelop and the Sparkling Red Charm . Pp. 11-26
  3. ↑ Penelop and the Sparkling Red Charm . Pp. 27-44
  4. ↑ Penelop and the Sparkling Red Charm . Pp. 45-63
  5. ↑ Penelop and the Sparkling Red Charm . Pp. 65-87
  6. ↑ Penelop and the Sparkling Red Charm . Pp. 89-105
  7. ↑ Penelop and the Sparkling Red Charm . Pp. 107-152
  8. ↑ Penelop and the Sparkling Red Charm . Pp. 153-185
  9. ↑ Penelop and the Sparkling Red Charm . Pp. 187-222
  10. ↑ Penelop and the Sparkling Red Charm . Pp. 223-240
  11. ↑ Penelop and the Sparkling Red Charm . Pp. 241-254
  12. ↑ S. Fischer Verlag : Penelop and the sparkling red magic. Content . Retrieved December 16, 2019
  13. ↑ boersenblatt.net: Zurich Children's Book Prize is being reissued , from August 24, 2017. Accessed February 10, 2018
  14. ↑ Ulmer Unke Children's and Young People's Book Prize: These are the 2017 winners . Retrieved February 10, 2018
  15. ↑ buecherpiraten.de: Penelop and the sparkling red magic - 2017 award winner , accessed on December 20, 2019
  16. ↑ Rhenish reading festival for children and young adults Captain Book: Valija Zinck . Retrieved February 10, 2018
  17. ^ S. Fischer Publisher : Vita . Retrieved February 10, 2018
  18. ↑ a b Foundation Reading : Penelop and the Sparkling Red Magic . Retrieved February 10, 2018
  19. ↑ a b Verena Hoenig: Magical crawling bulbs . In: Süddeutsche Zeitung of May 11, 2017. Accessed February 10, 2018
  20. ↑ Kölner Stadt-Anzeiger : Literature tips: These are the most beautiful new books for children and young people , from June 6, 2017. Accessed on February 10, 2018
  21. ↑ Karin Steinfeld-Bartelt: Penelop and the sparkling red magic . In: Borromeo Association . Retrieved December 18, 2019