And then the most extraordinary thing happened.

It was a snowflake the most beautiful he had ever seen, for it was magnified into an exquisite and intricate pattern: a star glistening like crystal in the soft light.

One is a model of a maimed horse with a label attached which reads: ‘Dim hon!’ – ‘Not this!’ Thus begins a series of events which continue with the arrival of a tiny silver spider that Gwyn names ‘Arianwen’: the snow spider. Nain gives Gwyn a strange collection of gifts for his ninth birthday, with the instruction to ‘give them to the wind’. Gwyn’s father, Nain’s son, blames Gwyn for her disappearance. Four years previous, again on Gwyn’s birthday, his elder sister Bethan disappeared. Nain is an important character, but the central figure is Gwyn Griffiths, her grandson, who as The Snow Spider opens is approaching his ninth birthday. Somewhere, through the jumble, a kettle lurked, and soon this was whistling merrily, while Nain sang from behind a screen embroidered with butterflies, and a canary chattered in its cage.īack to the books. The fronds of shawls, trailing leaves and garlands of beads festooned the furniture … the whole place had a wild and mystical air about it. All the corners had been rounded off with cupboards and bookcases, and upon every item of furniture there was heaped a jumble of books, bright clothes and exotic plants. The inside of her house was like a bright bowl. It was followed by Emlyn’s Moon (1987) and The Chestnut Soldier (1989). It won the Nestlé Smarties Book Prize and also the Tir na n-Og Award from the Welsh Books Council, recognising the year’s best English-language children’s book with an authentic Welsh background. Book one, The Snow Spider, was published in 1986. The series is officially named The Magician’s Trilogy, but seems better known (and has recently been published in omnibus form) using just the name of the first book. Jenny Nimmo has lived in Wales for over forty years and has written many books for children since The Snow Spider was published, but it was that original book in this trilogy which brought her name to wider audiences. I’ve wanted to read the remaining books in the series for some while they were readily available on my Kindle and a well-written children’s book involving Welsh magic seemed an excellent place to start. Although I came to it as an adult, it left a haunting and hard-hitting impression of loss and loneliness. I opened my reading for the Welsh readathon, hosted by Paula at Book Jotter, with a trio of children’s books, the first of which I knew well. (Read as part of Dewithon 19 and for The Classics Club.)

The snow spider by jenny nimmo