Tripods: The White Mountains

"It begins in a version of England, where people live what is almost a medieval life, but there are artefacts left over from what we might think of as modern life. As a kid, I first became aware of it as a TV series, but I only ever saw little snippets of it. In the story, Earth has been taken over by H.G. Wells-ish ‘Tripods’, which enslave people by ‘capping’ them. When you reach the age of 14, you get taken up into one of these Tripods and they put a ‘cap’ on your head, which makes you very submissive and obey the will of the Tripods. It’s about a boy called Will who is about to become 14 and be capped. He meets what is known as a ‘vagrant’, which is a person who has been capped and gone insane. This vagrant, called Ozymandias, turns out not to be insane at all and he tells Will that there is a place in Switzerland where people live in freedom. Will and his cousin set off on a treacherous journey to reach Switzerland and be free. I think the appeal for me is that the kids are on their own and they have to survive on the road. They have to find food and shelter, and learn who they can and can’t trust, all while evading the Tripods which are hunting them. It’s about free will, but I think as a young reader, it was the idea of these giant Tripods stomping around the Earth that excited me."