This post accompanies chapter nine of A Children’s Crusade and should be read in conjunction with it. The title is a fairly obvious musical reference, although I changed the grammar to fit the context; the fact that it’s the ninth chapter was just coincidence, but the action does represent a series of plot reversals (from six to nine is not just an expansion, but also an inversion), although not all of these are immediately obvious. What is obvious is that Marta’s role as Mission rebel has been decisively usurped by her arch enemies, Rai and Jorja, who go much further than she would have ever dared at this stage in her personal journey!
The focus of the story shifts; we are not seeing entirely from our heroine’s POV, and this is reflected by a change in the narrative style. In previous chapters my normal practice has been to use a privileged third person, telling the story as if we’re looking over the protagonist Marta Fernandes’ shoulder. We shift briefly to Jorge’s POV in Fear of flying, but in If six were nine, longer passages are seen from Jorja’s perspective, and the use of italics delineates this…
This can be regarded as foreshadowing, letting us know that Marta Fernandes is no longer going to be the centre of everything; and from a psychological point of view this represents a development in her thinking, the point in a child’s life when she realizes that the world doesn’t entirely revolve around her!
We learn more about the topography of Alpha 5; we now know it has an active volcano, and vast plains beyond the Barrier range which even have lakes. We also get a glimpse of the Polar Barrier where the northern ice sheets begin. The children begin to take possession of their world by naming bits of it!
We learn that Jorja’s loathing of Marta is profound and this is one of the reasons she agrees to Rai’s plan; and the social politics of the expanded group come into sharper focus!
We also learn a lot more about Alphane ecology and its implications for life on the planet. Marta gets to show her leadership qualities once more, but another potential rival emerges in Sal…!
But above all else this is a great adventure! The crew are pioneers, but pioneers who are still children, with all that entails. So on one level it’s a SF Swallows and Amazons at this point in the chronology, but children grow up…
Re-reading the chapter while preparing this post, I realised how much changes in this episode of the story, and how pivotal it actually is. So in a sense the world is turned upside down as six becomes nine…