posted on 08 Dec 2018

Ossiri and the Bala Mengro by Richard O’Neill and Katherine Quarmby illustrated by Hannah Tolson

Set in the Traveller community, this is a delightful story with a rather dark little twist at the end. Ossiri, a Traveller girl, is part of a family that earns its money as ‘Tattin Folki’ or rag-and-bone people but Ossiri’s greatest wish is to be  musician. Sadly though, the family isn’t rich enough to buy her an instrument or let her travel around as musicians do to earn a living – she needs to stay and help the family in their Tattin business.

But Ossiri won’t give up on her dream and she resolves to make her own instrument out of scrap parts:

“She shaped it and smoothed it, drilled holes into it and fixed things to it….Ossiri called her instrument the Tattin Django.”

When it was finished she played it proudly for the rest of her family – and everyone agreed it was a truly HORRIBLE sound! They begged her to stop making such a noise and her Grandmother told her that although it looked lovely she needed to practice hard to make it sound better.

The family move on to live in Lancashire, a county with plenty of hills where Ossiri would be able to go off and practice without disturbing anyone. But she is told by a local farmer’s daughter that the noise of her instrument was a great danger to everyone because it could waken a local ogre – the Bala Mengro - that lives in a cave in the hills.

Ossiri promises never to go into the hills alone and play her instrument but she just can’t resist – and, of course, she wakes the Bala Mengro. But far from chasing after her, the ogre loves the music and rewards Ossiri with treasure everytime she comes to play to him.

As Ossiri becomes richer from her music, inevitably someone sees a chance to get a piece of the action for themselves and soon her instrument is stolen by someone who thinks they can cash in on the ogre’s generosity.

But that turns out to be a terrible mistake……….But you’ll have to read the story yourself to find out why.

The story is beautifully illustrated by Hannah Tolson, a freelance illustrator based in Cornwall, whose colourful, almost naïve drawings bring the story to life. I liked the representation of the ogre in particular who has something of the Gruffalo about him.

Richard O’Neill is a storyteller from the Traveller community (see our interview feature with him on this link) and Katherine Quarmby is a seasoned author and journalist. Together they have crafted the story that uses words from the Traveller lexicon without causing any difficulties for the younger reader but will introduce them to new and different words.

This is an excellent picture storybook that tells a story from the Traveller community without making the Traveller identity an 'issue'- and that’s greatly to be welcomed.

 

Terry Potter

December 2018