A Response to "The Underneath"

Next to The Book Thief, this was my favorite book so far. I connected to this book mostly because I am such a dog lover and a cat lover. This book reminded me a lot of The People Could Fly in that it read like folklore, mostly because of the talking and feeling animals. There were also clear morals in place. I therefore felt that adolescents would enjoy this book greatly because of its nature(pun intended). The moral that resonated with me the most was the paradoxical nature of humanity. Humans exist in a hostile world, yet, it is a world that is desirable. The snakes in the story wanted so badly to be apart of human nature, yet human nature is full of heartache, such as death. However, at the same time, the dog and cats experienced heartache, just as the humans did. I appreciated that it showed both the animals and the humans being cruel but what it really boiled down to was love. In the end (spoiler alert!) the snake sees love even though she is still miserable. This love causes her to not act on her bitterness and instead, to die, allowing others to live happily. This story seems extremely cheesy. A story about love, really? However, I would recommend this story for adolescents because of its storytelling abilities and the way it presents a story about love.


Although I found "love" to be the most prominent moral of this story, some other issues are here to study as well; issues such as class and race. The Underneath seems to be making a commentary on these issues and the ways the government deals with them (or doesn't).  


As I mentioned before, I am unfamiliar with the fantasy genre. I would not have placed The Underneath in this genre. Therefore, I was shocked when I started reading this book to find out that this was in the fantasy genre. Because of this book, I think I will explore this genre. To be honest, I assumed it to be filled with books that were only in the realm of The Lord of the Rings (not my cup of tea). 


Finally, another one of the merits of this book are the small chapters that bounce back and forth between the different situations or perspectives of the forest. Similar to the film, Crash (2004), the lives of these humans and creatures all find a way to merge in the end. I find this to be a very strong technique because it provides the message that we are all connected; we should help one another because we don't know when we'll need someone to return the favor.