I have just read the most amazing book. I sat down to read a bit, to see if it was any good, and I could not put it down. I read it all at once, forcing myself to slow down and really see the words because I was so desperate to see what would happen and yet loved what author Robert Wiersema was doing with the story along the way to the end. I read it start to finish all at once and I loved it, even though it is not an exciting plot, and not a happy one. It's just good, really really good.

It's a novella called The World More Full of Weeping and everyone should read this book.

Most of the emails I receive about books are for Bookslut and don't even acknowledge my personal site which is fine (and to be expected). World came to me via Brett at Chizine Publications through a personal email however. He knew about my site, he knew books I have read and reviewed and he thought this one would work for me. When I found out it was about an eleven year old boy who disappears into the forest I told him there was no way - no way in hell - that I was going to read a book where little boy parts start to appear. Brett promised no bloody boy murder and so I took him on his word and gave it a shot and Wiersema just hits this one out of the park.

The plot revolves around Brian and his father who live in the small town of Henderson, north of Vancouver. His divorced parents have decided that the local school isn't good enough and so Brian is to go off to his mother's in the city and will visit his dad on weekends and vacations. He does not want to go and says so but is largely ignored. He gets the "we know what is best for you line" and that's the end of the argument. Brian heads off into the woods right behind the house with a promise he will be back in time to meet his mother. He does not return.

What follows are parents coming quietly unhinged by the search and rescue as any parent would. As the present time plot moves forward with everyone reminding the father of how he once got lost in the woods for two days as a kid (and oddly has no memory of it), a dual plot line goes back to show just how much and on what a personal level Brian loves the woods. This is a kid who takes his own microscope out to the creek so he can collect and analyze water samples. We're talking serious Charles Darwin tendencies - the woods are not just a casual place for him to have a good time, they are significant. His father, still missing his marriage, has not noticed how serious Brian is about the woods, or how much he clearly wishes his father would care enough to notice. It's a typical story in that respect but it doesn't make Brian any less poignant. You really feel for this kid and how powerless he feels and you understand how desperate he would become over the thought of leaving. And you understand how he would tell his friend Carly and turn to her for help.

Carly is the girl no one else ever meets, the one only Brian knows. And she takes him places in the woods he can not imagine and she loves them just as much as he does and she understands why he doesn't want to leave. He meets Carly every day he goes into the woods and the last day, of course, he meets her again.

Okay, it's not a horror story, I promise. There are no bloody bits, no screams, no monsters. But it certainly has an element of the fantastic and as the parallels unfold between Jeff's disappearance and his son's, you will read each page faster and faster and faster. You will have an idea where it is going but you won't really want to rush it. You want to savor it; you want to feel it. You don't want to let this story go. The ending is just as it should be, promise.

If I had to compare it to anything, I would say Stephen King before all hell breaks lose. One of the things King is best at me (to me) is writing realistic kids and Wiersema's Brian is 100% honest and true. Yes, his parents are thinking of what is best for him but no, they don't have a clue what is really best. If they knew their kid they would realize that but for all their love for him (and they do love him), they have lost knowing him in the midst of their own problems. When he walks into the woods he isn't really leaving them because in truth, they both left him months before.

Divorce sucks, in case you're wondering.

Wiersema has a long essay on place tacked on to the end that is excellent reading as well. He also wrote a supernatural bestseller in Canada, Before I Wake, that sounds pretty amazing. I'll be including a bit about The World More Full of Weeping in a SFF column later this year - it's written for adults but I think perfect for teens, just as so much of King is. They will get Brian on a visceral level, I'm sure.

What a wonder this story is - what a small and perfect wonder.