is Märchenmond by Wolfgang & Heike Hohlbein.
Thinking about it I was a bit surprised because I was convinced it would be Sunshine by Robin McKinley – which is and will probably remain my favourite book. It’s the one that cheers me up no matter what and has been read too many times to count. It’s like a medicine, which given I’m full of a cold right now is apt but when I actually thought about it it’s not the one that I’m the most grateful for.
I was twelve when I read Märchenmond all the way through, I had started it once before but it was too long and I gave up after the first chapter. The hero is a boy and I didn’t much like boys… My parents had bought it for me after someone at school had raved about it, though now I seem to remember that was The NeverEnding Story* – they are somewhat similar I suppose.
Bizarrely I was in England when I began reading it, it was Christmas and I was sitting in a rocking chair while the remainder of my family was in church and my father as upstairs sleeping. By that stage he probably wasn’t well enough to have travelled to the UK but I’d refused to spend the first Christmas after mum had died alone with him and my older sister.
(Disclosure: Our family is very large, broken and very confusing to go into details would make this entry about three times as long and make me sound like I’m having a pity party. Yes that Christmas was awful and I hated Christmas for years after but I like it now. 
)
With nothing to do and bored I began following Kim on his adventure. I don’t remember how long it took me to finish, I’m sure it was a few days as I wasn’t a fast reader back then. That Christmas was the last one I would spend with my father, he died a few months later and I moved from Germany to England.
All of this sounds awful and why am I blogging about it?
Well because Märchenmond was the first time a book helped me. After that I found comfort in many more stories but it was Märchenmond that made my twelve year-old self forgot where she was and for that I’m very grateful.
*that’s Die unendliche Geschichte to me, if you’re interested.
FYI – the book has been translated!
