THE PULL OF THE OCEAN

This French recasting of Perrault’s Tom Thumb into a surreal contemporary version is both mesmerizing and strange. Very short chapters, each told in different voices, recount the tale of the seven Doutreleau brothers: three pairs of twins and Yann, the youngest, who is a little person and mute. Yet his brothers understand him, and when he says that their rough and unkempt parents are going to kill the boys, they believe him and run away. Hitching a ride with a trucker, filching train tickets and sandwiches, the boys follow Yann, who says they must get to Bordeaux and the ocean. Along the way, various country people describe their own sightings of the group, until they are trapped and come close to death. The prose is nightmarish but occasionally lovely, and older readers will appreciate its dark magic. (Fiction. 10-14)