Luna and the Heart of the Forest

Luna, 11, and her father, nicknamed Big Bear, are visiting Newfoundland. Her father is a journalist who travels the world with his young daughter looking for interesting stories, exploring unusual places, and learning about various cultures. As a result, Luna does not have a traditional childhood. “She got to see the world and learn from it. Being clever wasn’t just about using her brain, it was filling it with as much as she could,” (p. 5) Luna and her father are very close because Luna’s mother passed away of cancer when Luna was five-years-old.

While in Newfoundland, Luna wants to soak up as much of the landscape and mythology as she can. She dreams of discovering strange ghostly creatures in the wilderness. Her father watches her very closely and gives her specific rules to follow to keep her safe, but Luna likes to tempt fate and break the rules. “The fairy tale landscape called to Luna, who thought a mythology book on a cold night was pretty much perfection.” (p. 11) She is fascinated by the Newfoundland fog and likes to wander away from her father into the forest. “She thought, On quests, you go with the magic of the moment. This was a moment, and there was the magic, and she wanted to follow it.” (p. 18)

Luna and her father arrive in Dove Cove and stay at the home of one of the residents named Gordon. He describes the heartbreaking details of how the fishing stocks were depleted and local fishermen and their families had to leave their homes just to survive. “So, folks had to stop fishing, which meant they stopped working, which meant they had to either leave the province, or find another place to work.” (p. 47) They also had to make environmental compromises such as cutting down trees for lumber mills. Luna wanders away from her father into the woods. In the mysterious forest, she encounters a dying fox, a mushroom field, a number of ravens, and a scary monster. At first, she calls the monster The Thing but soon finds out his name is Billy. She realizes that he poses a real threat to her safety but manages to save herself. She escapes, taking with her a magical pinecone which was part of the mystical tree called The Heart of the Forest.

Despite her close call with Billy, Luna continues to look for opportunities to explore and encounter ghostly creatures in the forest. Luna and her father find the terrifying ghost Gale Hair who curses her father. Luna must now work to save her father from the spell of the ghost with the help of the magical pinecone, the ghostly Viking Trygve, and a talking whale.

Luna is a daring and courageous character who encounters a myriad of ghostly creatures in Luna and the Heart of the Forest. Her quest to save her father from Gale Hair is full of strange monsters and daring escapes from danger. The lengthy passages devoted to Luna’s final quest are very descriptive and philosophical. There are long discussions about ghosts, life, and death.

Luna and the Heart of the Forest is Adam Karlin’s first novel, and it was loosely based on his experiences working as a journalist for the “Lonely Planet” series of guidebooks. The novel is a combination of horror, fantasy, family tragedy, travelogue, and adventure. Luna’s final quest to save her father takes more than half of the book, and some of passages describing the journey could have been edited to make the narrative more effective. This novel deals with many topics, including Newfoundland history/geography/economics, family relationships, environmentalism, the concept of home, ghosts, Vikings, sea creatures, and friendship. In the end, Luna learns what a home really is: “Because home can be anywhere. Home is what you make it…” (p. 211)