Review of Tuck Everlasting by Natalie Babbitt

The plot is thin but it was fun entertainment for a boring and hot afternoon, right before the wheel turns over to August. A nice palate cleanser between heavier reads too.

Having a 17 year old promise a future relationship with a 10 year old was… a choice. Stories about immortal characters always annoy me because, while age does affect brain chemistry, I feel like the accumulation of life experiences are what grant people maturity, so presumably a boy who’s been “17” for eighty years has taken all the opportunities he can to do what 17 year old boys like to do. Why would he be interested in holding out for a 10 year old if he’s likely fallen in love a bunch of times before? Well, I should get my mind out of the gutter, questions like this likely swoosh by the target audience’s heads, and as a kid I probably would have swooned over this “romance” for better or for worse.

Apparently some people really dislike the ending (probably because they were really holding out for that eternal romance – I like how Babbitt stressed “if she decided”), but I found it fun and endearing. My copy included an interview with Babbitt and she talked about how she originally wanted to be an illustrator instead of a writer – I can certainly see she has a way of painting her words, and it’s easy to picture Rackham-like illustrations accompanying her writing.