Big Julie Criscoll Versus the Whole Wide World

Big Julie Criscoll Versus the Whole Wide World is Emma Morley’s illustrated novel for older children, shaped around a school production of Oliver! Its journey from a story Emma believes in, through a complete run of publisher rejections, to a finished paperback read by Dexter Mayhew makes it both a record of her persistence and a concrete sign of the writing life she has made for herself.

Identity and Form

The novel is a school story, and, more particularly, a romance for older children set in a comprehensive school in Leeds. Its central figure, Julie Criscoll, is a mouthy, irresponsible girl playing the Artful Dodger in the school production of Oliver! The combination gives the book a recognisable school-story framework while grounding its action in a specific theatrical undertaking and in Julie’s point of view. The description of it as a real-life, gritty version of Mallory Towers signals a deliberate contrast: familiar school-story territory, but approached with a rougher, more irreverent sensibility.

The prose is interleaved with illustrations: scratchy doodles, caricatures, and sarcastic speech bubbles of the kind associated with a teenage girl’s diary. These are not merely mentioned as decoration. The mixture of text and visual asides is part of the book’s identity, and later becomes one of the features Dexter singles out when he tells Emma what he enjoyed. The form thus joins its subject matter: a girl’s school world is rendered not only through the narrative but through a lively, personal-looking visual layer.

Writing and Rejection

Emma first sends out twenty thousand words, then waits until she has received a rejection from every publisher to whom she submitted them. The letters form a complete set. Their standard, vague wording offers little evidence that the manuscript has been read closely, but their accumulation makes the setback unmistakable. Emma has written and abandoned other things; this is the first work she has finished without wanting to throw it across the room. Her conviction that it is good survives the rejections, even though none of them provides a practical route forward.

She has influential contacts from college, but has privately resolved not to ask for favours. Seeking help from more successful contemporaries feels to her like asking a friend for money. Repeated rejection, together with her mother’s reminder that she is not getting any younger, eventually changes what she is willing to do. During a lunch break she finds a quiet classroom, takes a deep breath, and phones Stephanie Shaw, whom she has not spoken to for three years. They still like each other, and after catching up Emma asks Stephanie to read some chapters and an outline for what she calls a silly book for teenagers about a school musical. That request is a reluctant departure from her rule against using connections, but also a practical step toward giving the manuscript another chance.

A Book Becomes Tangible

When the novel next appears as a physical object, it is on a train arriving in Paris. Emma is waiting at the Gare du Nord among lovers, families, and chauffeurs, while Dexter remains in the last carriage until the other passengers have left. He has no suitcase, only a small overnight bag; on the table before him lies a brightly coloured paperback bearing a scratchy cartoon of a girl’s face beneath the book’s title. The book’s presence links Emma’s achievement to the meeting she is awaiting, before either of them has spoken.

Dexter has finished it as the train entered the Paris suburbs. The accomplishment is modest by his own measure: it is the first novel he has finished in months, but it is intended for readers aged eleven to fourteen and contains pictures. Even so, he looks closely at the black-and-white photograph of the author inside the back cover, studying Emma’s face and recognising her expression and the gesture of her hand over her mouth as she laughs. He puts the book in his bag and joins the last passengers stepping down to the platform. The paperback therefore carries both the public fact of publication and a private familiarity: Dexter has read Emma’s work and recognises something of her in the author photograph.

Reception and Significance

When Emma dismisses the novel as a silly children’s book, Dexter tells her he thought it was wonderful. He says he read it straight through in one sitting and praises its excitement and humour. His response is specific rather than merely congratulatory: he points to the large type and the illustrations, calling the pictures really funny, and tells Emma he is proud of her. He then pulls out a pen and asks her to sign the book. What Emma has treated with self-deprecation, Dexter receives as a finished work worth reading, discussing, and keeping as an object associated with its author.

The novel’s significance in these scenes rests on several distinct forms of persistence and recognition. Emma’s faith in the manuscript outlasts a full set of impersonal rejections; her decision to approach Stephanie marks a change in her refusal to ask for help; and the paperback in Dexter’s hands confirms that the work has reached readers beyond its author. His praise does not erase the difficulty of getting the book read or turn publication into an uncomplicated triumph. Instead, the contrast between Emma’s apologetic description of it and Dexter’s absorbed, detailed response makes the book a measure of the distance between her own doubts and another person’s pleasure in what she has made.