A World Below

Written by Wesley King

A Paula Wiseman Book/Simon & Schuster Books for Young Readers

978-1-4814-7822-9

261 pp.

Ages 8-14

2018

It's a dark, dark place in the caves and tunnels of New Mexico's Carlsbad Caverns and Eric, Silvia and the other students of Mr. Baker's small advanced middle-school class are going to find out just how dark it can be when a field trip goes from scholarly to scary.

When an earthquake hits, sending rocks falling and splitting the ground beneath, teacher Mr. Baker disappears into one crack and the kids are dragged deep into the earth by currents of cold water. When thirteen-year-old Eric Johnson drags himself out of the water, he finds himself alone and determined to find his way out. The other students have travelled further down, unable to extricate themselves until they reach still waters. After reviving one student with CPR, Silvia Rodrigues who is desperately trying to keep her anxiety in check is unofficially designated their leader and suggests they find Eric. But, in addition to chapters focusing on Eric and Silvia's perspectives, there are those told of a boy of similar age, Carlos, the King of the Midnight Realm, who is determined to keep his underground community safe from the exiled traitors called Worms and the dangerous "surface humans."

In an adventure-survival story that feels a bit like a melding of Indiana Jones with The Lord of the Flies without the creepy parts, Wesley King, award-winning author of The Vindico (Penguin, 2012) and OCDaniel (Paula Wiseman/Simon & Schuster, 2016) celebrates kids who may see themselves as different and even weak because of their mental health issues or personalities but who are strong and bright and resilient and the stuff of heroes. Silvia tries to hide the vulnerability she feels with her anxiety and panic attacks that keep her from sleeping well but her peers see her as brave and a true leader. Eric and Carlos are living with the reminders of their fathers' strengths or failings and judging themselves by those memories. Eric's father, before leaving to make a new family, was a jerk to Eric's mom and called Eric weird because he was a loner who liked to read. Carlos is trying to lead his people as his father before him did but sees his compassion and insight as contrary and consequently dangerous to those he is destined to rule.

"We shouldn't be spending our whole lives trying to be exactly like our parents. That won't work." (pg. 189)

In an extraordinary world of tree-like mushrooms, rats the size of beagles, spiders and catfish-like creatures as large as cars, and oppressive darkness only relieved by occasional bioluminescence and intermittent flashlight or cell phone light, these young people struggle through their fears, shared and not, to survive and even learn about others and themselves.

"But keeping my distance ... it's just ... easy."
"Stupid things usually are," she said simply. (pg. 215)

Like Jean Craighead George's book My Side of the Mountain, to which both Eric and Wesley King both reference, A World Below allows young people to see what separation from our peers and families can deliver. It gives us a chance to see ourselves as we are, not as others might see us or as we think we are seen. There's a clarity of perception that comes with focusing on what really matters–here, survival–and finding new realities, both within and externally. A World Below may be a coming-of-age story, based solely on the youth of the characters and their efforts to understand themselves and the world around them, but it goes beyond that, guiding readers through the darkness of twisted thinking and fears and into the light of understanding and empathy for self and others.