Secret Art and Adventure in The Pharaohs’ Cry

A sketching habit he must hide

Bartholomew is forbidden to attend school, play outside, or make art. He sketches anyway, in secret. That is the starting point of Laurie Woodward’s Artania - The Pharaohs’ Cry, a fantasy in which a restricted creative life opens onto a much larger adventure.

Meeting Alexander DeVinci, a skateboarding artist, brings Bartholomew into Artania. Paintings live and sculptures breathe there. The novel makes art a place the boys can enter and defend, giving their creative interests a direct role in what happens next.

A world that needs its artists

Artania faces destruction from Sickhert’s army. Bartholomew and Alexander have Egyptian gods and goddesses alongside them as they encounter battles and narrow escapes involving skateboarding. Their abilities and interests belong to the action rather than remaining background details.

Stopping the army and restoring art give the friends an objective larger than finding their own way through danger. Artania's need for its artists makes their involvement consequential to the world around them. Their response will determine whether they can do more than witness the threat gathering in the realm.

Creativity as a fantasy premise

Drawing and sculpture are connected to Artania's existence and danger, giving creativity a practical role in the adventure. Making art brings the characters into a world that needs their involvement. The things they create matter beyond the private act of creation, becoming part of what they must understand and protect.