A delightful read, which exemplifies two or three characteristics especially important in children’s books. The first of these is a catalyst right at the start (or nearly so). If we look at some other well-done (or at least popular) children’s stories, all or nearly all of the following have the inciting incident occurring within the first chapter: Redwall—we meet Clooney the Scourge in the first chapter; Mossflower—Martin the Warrior is captured by the wildcats in chapter one; A Series of Unfortunate Events: The Bag Beginning—the children learn of their parents’ deaths in chapter one; The Tale of Despereaux—as soon as he’s born Despereaux is shown to be a queer mouse, contrary to popular standards, but the actual inciting incident occurs shortly thereafter, when he falls in love with the princess; The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe—the first chapter is titled, “Lucy Looks into a Wardrobe,” and that’s what happens; Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone—as Tim Hickson points out, the first chapter is really a prologue, and in it occurs the inciting incident (the Potters’ murders and Harry’s “adoption” by the Dursleys); but chapter two includes the vanishing glass, Harry’s first obvious display of magic; Bridge to Terabithia—the Burkes move in next door in chapter one, and the narrator says, “[Jess] thought later how peculiar it was that here was probably the biggest thing in his life, and he had shrugged it off as nothing.” In all of these, the inciting incident is early, hooking the reader just a few pages in. This is not to say that “adult” books do not have early catalysts. But Tolstoy’s chapters of subtextual flirtation in Anna Karenina are less likely to captivate (or even be understood by) a child; and a child is less likely to put up with Dostoevsky’s chapter of exposition in The Brothers Karamazov before the plot actually begins. In children’s books, nuance appears little, and patience has to be earned before it is tried. At least that seems to be the rule.
Before we look at The Mysterious Benedict Society, there is one other aspect of the catalyst in children’s books that the above examples contain: that of tone. The first chapter, and specifically the inciting incident, give the reader a good idea of the tone and mood of the book. How many times did we, as children, pick up a book off the library shelf (judging first by title and cover), skip the description on the back, and read the first page or paragraph in order to judge whether we can take it in our small allotment of weekly books? Or how many times did we, upon receiving a book, read the first page or two, and put it down because we weren’t in the mood or it didn’t seem very interesting? The inciting incident, which lures one into the deeper plot, must appear very early and give the reader an idea of the plot and tone of the book they are considering reading. Let’s refer back to the earlier examples. Redwall and Mossflower are tales of cruel tyrants oppressing innocent woodlanders who are defended by a mouse hero. The first chapter of each of these gives us the hero, the evil villain, their initial encounter (or, in Redwall, the moment before that encounter), the motif of good versus evil, and the tone of homey woodlander life to be protected (in Redwall, we see the life to be protected; in Mossflower, we see the poverty resulting when it is taken away, and later we see what it used to be like before the wildcat regime). The Bad Beginning begins with the death of the protagonists’ parents. It also begins with a good deal of exposition and introduces us to the darkly humorous narrator. The inciting incident in The Tale of Despereaux introduces us to a central theme of the book: nonconformity in the midst of a very traditional society, and knightly virtues. The inciting incidents in Harry Potter and The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe introduce both the magic and its character (quirky powers for the former, whereas in the latter magic is more an adjective than a verb). The Bridge to Terabithia’s inciting incident, and the narrator’s comment about it, point to the theme of wonder in the ordinary: this story might not have magic or dragons, but don’t let that fool you—even little things can have great meaning.
I suppose that the inciting incidents in “adult” novels also tend to communicate the tone of the book. Perhaps it is typically part of inciting incidents as a whole. Either way, The Mysterious Benedict Society does a good job.
The aforementioned books leading by example, The Mysterious Benedict Society is a solidly good children’s book, and we can start with its inciting incident. The book starts off right where it should: with Rennie waiting to begin the second of Mr. Benedict’s odd tests. We happily take the following exposition, since it fills in the gaps we are already curious about: why is he alone, without any parents? What is this test? If this is the second, what was the first? In fact, the inciting incident—Rennie and his tutor finding the advertisement for gifted children looking for special opportunities—technically happens before the book begins. The book begins, not with answers, but with questions, both in the reader’s mind and in Rennie’s. This does three things: First, it unites the reader with the protagonist. Second, it ignites the reader’s curiosity, throwing him in the middle of a strange scene that begs many questions (which the book immediately begins to satisfy, but only while presenting still more—even to the end, which invites the reader himself to solve the mystery of Mr. Benedict’s name). Third, the reader has a good impression of the tone of the book: odd, quirky, filled with interesting characters and puzzles for those characters to solve alongside the reader.
The second great accomplishment of this book is pacing, which I alluded to above. The inciting incident takes place before the book even starts, and thus we hit the ground running. The entire book manages to keep a fairly fast pace, and a steady one, without much dramatic action. Again, the first chapter is a good example of this pacing—nothing dramatic happens, although odd for sure, yet there is always something interesting happening, and a lot of active doing, even in the exposition (e.g. Rennie’s parents died when he was an infant—instead of, Rennie’s parents were dead—and Rennie finished the high school textbooks and thus received a tutor, with whom he discussed the “Emergency” but subsequently read from the smaller news items and advertisements instead). The pace does vary in regards to things going well or things going poorly for the main characters, but there aren’t a lot of places where the reader might finish a chapter and feel content to put the book down for a day or two. It is difficult, I think, to keep that pacing without constant dramatic action (which becomes exhausting, at least for me). But the author found the tone of the book and stuck with it: this is not an action adventure story, it is a quirky mystery filled with constant puzzles and extraordinary children to solve them.
As a friend put it, this is a book for people who love to read, about people who love to read. I’ll likely read the others one day.
The Curious Critic 