The Light It Seeks (Review: Stone Junction by Jim Dodge)

Stone Junction: An Alchemical Potboiler  Jim Dodge
Rebel, Inc. 1997

Everybody has a few books which make a deep and lasting impression on them. Books which they read at just the right time, in just the right mood to ensure a well-worn copy remains on the nearest shelf for decades to come. Books which will inevitably worm their way into every single conversation about literature, no matter how tenuous the connection. For me there are three: Catch-22, my first ever 'serious' book and catalyst for my ever-strengthening pacifist views; Bad Wisdom for it's utterly compelling honesty and insanity; and Stone Junction: An Alchemical Potboiler, an indescribable wonder whose lack of general recognition both saddens me and makes me happy to belong to 'the club'. It is a masterpiece of magical realism, verging at times on urban fantasy and exhilarates as much as it breaks your heart. That it is one of only four volumes published by Jim Dodge (among them a collection of poems and a short children's book) makes it all the more precious.

Stone Junction is the story of Daniel Pearse, a young man emerging from a strange and wondrous childhood. Daniel finds himself adopted by the mysterious AMO, the Association of Magicians and Outlaws, an organisation his mother served throughout his early years. What follows is a coming-of-age story as Daniel finds himself passed from mentor to mentor through the ranks of the AMO, learning every imaginable trick of the trade along the way. From alchemy to card-sharking, he leaves no stone unturned in his quest for knowledge. Daniel is not just after an unorthodox education however; powering every step is his desire to finally discover what really happened on a pivotal night years before.

Throughout the course of his schooling Daniel is deposited with a number of unforgettable father-figures, some more than willing to take on a temporary apprentice, others less so. Here Dodge plays with the idea of Daniel's lack of a real father-figure, having never actually known his own. No matter how the mentors feel about their new charge, their vignettes are invariably as entertaining as they are inspiring and informative. Dodge draws on his own experience of inhabiting all manner of insalubrious worlds to paint each scene with enviable authenticity and warmth, suggesting an uncanny familiarity with everything from safe-cracking to drug ingestion. Even an extended game of Lo-Ball during the cards section is magically imbued with a level of interest and tension which should, given the subject matter, be impossible. When I first read this book back in university I even found myself hovering around the card games shelves in Waterstone's, pondering the feasibility of a career in Vegas (thankfully I had a combination of common sense and sloth to save me).

During the course of his training, Daniel begins to uncover his own hidden talents as well as honing those he has learnt and soon rises through the ranks of the AMO. Before long he is involved in the search for the Faith Diamond, a jewel of incredible size and purity which captures the imagination of all those who cross its path. Daniel is drawn to it instinctively and as time wears on it becomes more and more clear that the hunt for the diamond holds the answer to the fate of his long-lost mother and that which may await him as well.

Jim Dodge’s great strength is the warmth and authenticity which he manages to bestow on such a fantastical epic. You know you’re immersed in a world where magic is real, alchemy works and ornery old mules can speak but your disbelief remains suspended throughout. This is largely due to the strength of the characters themselves. Despite their otherworldly talents they remain the most down-to-earth, utterly real people you could hope to meet. You’ll find echoes of them in your own family and acquaintances and will even miss them once the story moves on and leaves them in the dust. Add to this cast an incredibly original, compelling and addictive story and you’ll wonder why this isn't paraded in bookstores everywhere as a paragon of modern literature.

Stone Junction is many things to many people. On the surface it’s an ensemble piece, focused on an unforgettable cast of characters who will carve out their own niche in your psyche and lurk there for quite some time afterwards, chattering and taunting. It’s a coming of age story revolving around a boy becoming a man and facing the demons of his past. It’s a tale of love, loss and redemption, of friendship and betrayal. It’s a touching homage to the author’s own youth, an autobiography viewed through the lens of an untamed imagination.

However you see Stone Junction, one thing is certain: it will not leave you unchanged. Take a deep breath, submerge yourself in it and let its wonders wash over you. You’ll not regret it.

This review was brought to you by Cannonball Jones. Both he and Splendibird read this book the same week, many years ago, and both urge you to pick up a copy NOW. Stone Junction is available in all good bookstores.

What Kind of Love am I Facing? (Review: The Secret of Ella and Micha by Jessica Sorensen)

The Secret of Ella and Micha

Jessica Sorensen

Sphere 2013

Ella and Micha have been friends forever, seeing each other through their difficult childhoods.  However, after a series of tragic events, Ella realises that she needs to leave her past behind and flees to college, leaving Micha behind with no idea of where she is or whether she will ever return.  While Micha has searched for her, suspended in place by the night she disappeared, Ella has spent the year reinventing herself but she can’t stay away forever and, come summer break, she finds herself returning to a house full of bad memories and the boy next door who won’t take no for an answer.

Ella is a character who will be quickly familiar to any readers of the newly minted New Adult genre.  Damaged by a past that involves both violence and neglect, she’s trying desperately to change her life.  Brittle, suspicious and fragile she’s also resourceful and smart – she got herself to college, made new friends, funded herself and seems to generally have her head screwed on the right way.  However, she’s clearly not come to terms with the events of her past and needs someone to help her do so.   So far, so NA protagonist.  And she really doesn’t get much more original.  The best that can be said for Ella is that she’s vaguely likeable and her character’s mental health is handled with a degree of care.  Her treatment of Micha is understandable, while selfish, and her reluctance to spend time with him a measure of her desire to escape a past she doesn’t really understand.

Micha, sadly, is also all too familiar.  When Ella returns he is understandably angry and hurt, as well as worried.  This could have been a great way to create a sympathetic, conflicted character but instead Micha reacts by turning into the rapidly emerging stereotypical male of the genre.  In order to get the attention of a girl whom he knows to be deeply damaged, he flirts with people in front of her, climbs unbidden into her bed (sadly another well-worn scenario in the world of NA), slides his hand up her skirt in public and states that he “has to have her”, seeming to truly believe that his moronic, testosterone fuelled claim on her will somehow ease her troubled past.  What a PRINCE!  In the few chapters in which Micha manages to get his mind away from his nethers, he actually comes across as quite a nice, thoughtful guy and later does address Ella’s long-standing intimacy issues but it’s too little, too late.  To be honest, the fact that he recognises that she has intimacy issues at all only sheds an even nastier light on his possessive, pushy behaviour.

The Secret of Ella and Micha is frustrating in that it has the potential to be so much more.  The issues raised are interesting, the family dynamics curious and the gorgeous best friend, desperately worried for his neighbour should be breath-takingly romantic.  But this is New Adult, people, and so rather than focus on the aforementioned plot points, The Secret of Ella and Micha focuses largely on sex.  Now sex scenes are fun, hell, more books should have them, but New Adult as a genre seems to use sex instead of storyline, regularly mixing it into stories in which the girls are damaged and the boys are lined up to convince them that therapy won’t work as well as a good dicking.  Certainly, consensual sex has a role in these storylines, with Ella and Micha it certainly represents her starting to overcome some issues, but the way in which the men in NA push their desire onto the women is, quite frankly, a bit icky – I don’t care how gorgeous they are. 

This isn’t the first NA book that has disappointed me. I keep reading the genre in the hope that one will appear that will illustrate to actual New Adults (whatever they are) that the start of your adult life isn’t necessarily filled with trauma and sexual manipulation.  Thus far, the best New Adult books I’ve read haven’t been published under that particular genre label but rather remained in the YA bracket.  Both Where She Went by Gayle Forman and Lovely, Dark and Deep by Amy McNamara look at issues surrounding a troubled past and an uncertain future, both feature protagonists in their late teens/early twenties and both feature sex; both, critically, handle it all far better than anything on the NA shelves, including, sadly, The Secret of Ella and Micha.

This review was brought to you by Splendibird who, in the pursuit of open-mindedness would like to state that she appears to be in the minority in her opinion. The Secret of Ella and Micha is available now. Thank you to the publisher for providing us with this title to review.

If You Go Down To The Woods (Review: A Tale Dark and Grimm by Adam Gidwitz)

A Tale Dark And Grimm

Adam Gidwitz

Puffin 2011

“"You're being foolish," Gretel told herself. "Rain can't talk."

No, of course it can't. The moon can eat children, and fingers can open doors, and people's heads can be put back on.

But rain? Talk? Don't be ridiculous.

Good thinking, Gretel dear. Good thinking.”

Okay, stop me if you’ve heard this one - a brother and sister go wandering off into the darkest depths of the forest, ignoring all of their parents’ warnings. Stumbling across a gingerbread house they proceed to gorge themselves until its haggard resident returns. She proceeds to fatten up the siblings, preparing them for a feast, when they turn the tables and roast her alive in her own oven. The end. Or so your own parents may have had you believe...

Adam Gidwitz’s A Tale Dark And Grimm is a loving homage to the stories of our childhood, taking the familiar tales and returning to them some of the grit and grime which have been slowly polished away in the centuries since their inception. Hansel and Gretel do indeed form the core of the story but the witch episode above is merely an early chapter in their grand epic. Weaving together eight separate tales, Gidwitz crafts his own cautionary fable about the dangers of the outside world, of trusting in strangers and, charmingly, of being a parent.

At the outset the parents are cast in the role of despicable villains, at least in the eyes of Hansel and Gretel. Due to a hideous curse (it’s a long story) their father, the king, reluctantly chops off their heads in order to save their lives. It’s alright, they get better. But old wounds have a tendency to reopen, especially when decapitation is involved, and as soon as the children learn what happened they set off into the great unknown on a quest for a more loving family.

Initially they seem to find success. New homes are waiting in every village with fathers in search of daughters, woodsmen in search of brides and witches in search of, erm, dinner. But behind every fairytale facade lurks rot and decay. Murderers enchant their victims before slaughtering them and imprisoning their souls in birdcages. Fatherly rejection turns brothers into sparrows, seeking refuge in far-off caves accessible through only the most gruesome of methods. And yes, there be dragons. Big ones.

Only a brave soul would attempt a retelling of such well-known tales but I’m pleased to say Adam Gidwitz carries out the task with aplomb. His knowledge of and love for the Brothers Grimm shines through in every tale, never allowing himself to become too cruel to his characters or to let them lose sight of the light at the end of their tunnel. Inevitably things do get a bit dark and grim sometimes - after all, these tales were originally more survival manuals than bedtime stories - but it’s all in the name of fun. He does take a perverse glee in dialling up the body count at times though, and bucketloads of blood are spilled throughout the proceedings.

Despite all the blood and horror, A Tale Dark And Grimm is held together in a light vein by Gidwitz’s fourth wall-breaking narration, infused with a wonderful sense of irony and knowing winks to the older reader. Regular urgings to rid the room of younger readers at tense moments only serve to heighten their interest and ensure a rapt audience. Children will all too readily identify with Hansel and Gretel, relating to their struggles against the grown-up world, while adults can chuckle away at the inside jokes and marvel at the masterful storytelling itself. Some of the light relief characters (the three ravens and their tangential conversations for example) come from the same comic stable as Pratchett and Python, nudging the story along while bringing us back down to earth after each adventure.

Despite expecting something aimed at a more mature level I found myself entranced by A Tale Dark And Grimm immediately and found myself cursing my classes for getting in the way of reading. The story just feels so genuine and steadfastly refuses to patronise children in the manner of the Disney-fied versions of the tales with which they are more familiar. Something about this honesty just makes it so endearing and yes, I admit it - I also loved the gore. So will your kids, I guarantee it.

This review was brought to you by Cannonball Jones.  A Tale Dark and Grimm is available now.