I don’t know who’s keeping score, but this is the fifth book that C.S. Lewis published in The Chronicles of Narnia series, yet it’s the third book chronologically, that is, in Narnian time. While the four Pevensie children reign at Cair Paravel in Narnia, a young man named Shasta has his own adventure further south.

In rescuing a talking horse from a bitter situation, Shasta escapes his own troubled life in which his adoptive father treats his as nothing more than a slave, striking out for freedom elsewhere. Bree, the horse, knows the way to a place where animals and talking beasts live in harmony, a place called Narnia. Along the way, they meet Aravis and her own talking horse, Hwin, and together they venture across wood and dale, mountains and deserts, in search of that land of promise. All is not well, of course, and danger meets them at many turns.

I read this fifth book to my kids, but they seemed not as into this one as they had been the others. It could have been the introduction of too many new characters, or perhaps the fact that the main characters in this story were entirely from Narnia and therefore completely detached from our own world. I don’t know if that’s the case, but it was something.

We’ve not read much fantasy together. Even as an adult, I have never been much into fantasy novels, which has made this whole process of reading through The Chronicles of Narnia a difficult bucket-lister for me! I can’t pinpoint why this is the case. Perhaps I like to fall deeply into a story as I read it, and I can’t do that when fauns and talking badgers and earth-dwelling dwarves are lurking about. If I can’t put myself into the story, it remains just that and therefore a waste of time. I know half the world disagrees with me, but I gotta be honest.

Aslan plays a more constant role in this story, yet without acknowledging himself or his presence. The claws on Aravis’ back as she was chased by the lion, for example, was an especially surprising scene. Was Lewis teaching through metaphor that God’s will and protection and salvation sometimes comes through pain? He’d written at length about that very issue elsewhere, so this could be his introduction to it.

One key lesson in this story is that Aslan refuses to tell anyone someone else’s story. At some points, when talking quietly with the children, he informs them of why he did certain things that he did. He tells them when and even how. Yet when their curiosities relate to the lives or situations of others, he responds, “That isn’t your story.” The answers to those questions weren’t for them to know.

While the story captures the essence of this peculiar lesson quite well, and while I think it could be an important lesson in life, I also think it needs to be fleshed out more before it can become a point of teaching. How often do we long to know someone else’s story when we don’t even know our own?

Daily, it seems, we are left without explanation to the events our lives, left only to trust our God who is all wise. I don’t think I ever struggle with wanting to know someone else’s story but rather my own, and that’s where I need to learn trust and patience. That’s where I think the discussion should probably stay.

While we got to see the Pevensie children during their 1,000-year reign (or whatever it was), they played a very minor role in this book. Only two left in the series, now! I can’t wait (to finish)!

©2021 E.T.

See More by C.S. Lewis:

• Nonfiction:
  The Screwtape Letters (1942)
  Reflections on the Psalms (1958)
• Space Trilogy:
  Out of the Silent Planet (1938)
  Perelandra (1943)
  That Hideous Strength (1945)
• The Chronicles of Narnia: 
  The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe (1950)
  Prince Caspian (1951)
  The Voyage of the Dawn Treader (1952)
  The Silver Chair (1953)
  The Horse and His Boy (1954)
  The Magician’s Nephew (1955)
  The Last Battle (1956)
• Other:
  Till We Have Faces (1956)