The Selected Works Of T S Spivet

05 May 2009

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When a twelve-year-old 12-year-old genius mapmaker T.S. Spivet receives an unexpected phone call from the Smithsonian informing him he has won the prestigious Baird Award, life as normal (if you consider mapping family dinner table conversation normal)is interrupted and a wild cross-country adventure begins, taking T.S. from his family ranch just north of Divide, Montana, to the museum's hallowed halls.

T.S. the son of a cowboy, his mother a scientist who for twenty years has been looking for a mythical species of beetle, a brother long gone, an unfathomable sister, and a mad dog.sets out alone to the Capital.

Leaving before sunrise.. his plan to hop a freight train and hitch east. Once on board, his adventures move on a pace as he meticulously maps, charts, and illustrates his exploits, documenting mythical wormholes in the Midwest, the urban phenomenon of "rims," and the more earthly pleasures of McDonald's.

This book is a treasure a work of art, an encyclopedia, and an almost unbearably touching novelJoclyn Manners

This is the world through T.S.'s eyes and in his thorough investigation of the outside world he also reveals himself.

Travelling from the ranch and his family the book illustrates how the journey also brings him closer to home. A secret family history found within his belongings tells the story of young Spivet's ancestors and how the arrived in Montana, demonstrating a somewhat profound insight into the family he left behind and his place within it. As T.S. discovers the sometimes shadowy boundary between fact and fiction he realises that, for all his analytical skills, the world around him is still a mystery.

All that he has learned is tested when he arrives at the capital to claim his prize and is welcomed into science's inner circle. For all its shine, fame seems more highly valued than ideas in this new world and friends are hard to find.

T.S.Spivet's trip begins at the Copper Top Ranch and the last known place he stands is Washington, D.C., but his journey's movement is far harder to track. How do you map the delicate lessons learned about family and self? How do you depict how it feels to first venture out on your own? Is there a definitive way to communicate the ebbs and tides of heartbreak, loss, loneliness, love? These are the questions that strike at the core of this very special debut.

This book is a treasure a work of art, an encyclopedia of life, and an almost unbearably touching novel

The Author:

Reif Larsen is twenty-eight, studied at Brown University, and has taught at Columbia University, where he is finishing his MFA in fiction. He is also a filmmaker and has made documentaries in the United States, the United Kingdom, and sub- Saharan Africa.

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