The Little Snake by A L Kennedy
Posted in A L Kennedy, Fable, Fantasy, Reading Reviewed, Scottish Fiction, Scottish Literature at 19:12 on 5 February 2024
Canongate, 2018, 137 p.
This is part of a departure for Kennedy. Her earlier books were short story collections and novels intended for adults. However in 2017 she started producing a series of children’s stories about featuring Uncle Shawn and Badger Bill – and llamas. The Little Snake is another diversion. On one level it is a children’s story, on another a fable, and on a third a meditation on death.
Mary is a girl living in a strange city where kites are flown from rooftops. One day she feels a strange sensation and observes a golden circlet round her ankle. This is the little snake Lanmo. Usually he is the angel of death, but with Mary he forms a friendship. Lanmo comes and goes many times throughout her life seeing her grow up, fall in love and mature while her (nameless) city becomes less and less hospitable as time goes by and war encroaches on its inhabitants.
Lanmo tells her of his sense of oddness that humans spend so much of their time contriving so many different ways to kill each other when their lives will end in any case. Selflessly he helps her escape to a better life but is in turn changed by her.
This is a book coloured by intimations of the modern world, the shadow of war, the necessity of migration, the kindness of strangers, the acceptance of death at the end of a life well lived.
For such a short book it carries quite a punch.
Pedant’s corner:- remarkably – even though the book is short – there is nothing to report here.
Tags: A L Kennedy, fable, Fantasy, Scottish Fiction, Scottish Literature, The Little Snake