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‘We need the literature of other countries to expand our
horizons and stimulate our ideas. Without it, we are not only
diminished, we are starved’
(The Times, Magnus Linklater 29/06/05)

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Title: To the Ice

Author: Thomas Tidholm

Translator: Julia Marshall

Illustrator: Anna-Clara Tidholm

Publisher: Gecko Press

Date Published: 2023

Format: Hardback

Genre:

Book Category: Fiction

Age Range: 6-8

Original Title: First published in Swedish as Isresan, Alfabeta Bokforlag AB, Sweden, 2020

Country of Origin: Sweden

To the Ice

by Thomas Tidholm
Age Range: 6-8

“There were three of us: Jack, Max and me, Ida. This is what happened to us. You might not believe it’s true, and we didn’t believe it ourselves, not even while it was happening. But this is how it was …”

These are the opening lines To the Ice by Swedish husband and wife team Thomas and Anna-Clara Tidholm which sets the tone for this thrilling arctic adventure.

Ida, the narrator, and brothers Max and Jack go to the creek one winter’s day. Everywhere there is thick snow with big ice floes sailing down the river. Jack ventures out onto the ice and Max and Ida follow. The ice floe holds their weight but breaks away and soon they are drifting downstream and out to sea. All the children have with them is a wooden box, a branch, some sandwiches and a thermos of tea.

Eventually, their ice flow freezes together with lots of others and becomes a kind of ice floor with a dusting of snow on top. Wherever they turn it looks the same. The children decide to walk towards the sun to find their way home. They walk and walk until they come across an old, dilapidated hut with a stove, beds, and lots of tins of fish balls! During their adventure the children experience the beauty of the aurora, meet penguins and test their resources to the limit until they safely return home at the end of the day.

Swedish author Thomas Tidholm’s prose, translated by Julia Marshall, deals humorously with the serious elements of the children being lost and alone with some profound observations from the narrator. “ Of course, we were worried and afraid, but if anyone lay awake crying then none of us could sleep. In the end, we decided that everyone who wanted to should cry at the same time, all together. After a few days, everyone stopped crying and we slept quite well.” “We had so much time. It was as if time didn’t exist anymore. The most important thing when that happens, and you don’t know how long it will last, is to know how to be bored!” The story also cleverly provides the realism of a polar expedition with the power of a child’s imagination. This is enhanced by Anna-Clara Tidholm’s rich and detailed artwork in mixed media or pen and ink outline with watercolour that captures perfectly the bleak ice-filled landscape.

Ideal for newly independent readers To the Ice is a beautifully produced chapter book full of adventure.

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