Teen/YA: July 2006 Archives

“It’s been the ‘wogs’, the ‘nappy heads’, the ‘foreigners’ the ‘persons of Middle Eastern appearance’, the Asians, the ‘oppressed’ women, the Greek Orthodox pensioner chain-smoker, the ‘salami eaters’, the ‘ethnics’, the narrow-minded and the educated, the fair-dinkum wannabes, the principal with hairy ears who showed me that I am a colourful adjective. It’s their stories and confrontations and pains and joys which have empowered me to know myself, challenged me to embrace my identity as a young Australian-Palestinian-Muslim girl.”

At the start of the novel Amal Mohsamed Nasrullal Abdel-Hakim is beginning a new year at school. She makes the decision to wear the hajib (veil), a choice which shocks the staunchly traditional McCleans Grammar School – with ‘more than one hundred years of proud history’ –, shakes her friends and concerns her parents.

An interesting balance between being assimilated into Australian society and retaining one’s religious and cultural convictions is found by Amal. Enviably, this breaks down some of the stereotypical views of Islam that have been promulgated in the wake of terror… It also provides a fresh outlook on what in essence are fairly mainstream topics in teenage literature.

Amal finds romantic interest in studious, sensitive Adam, this is tempered towards close friendship, conflicts arise resulting from parental influence and there are preoccupations with image and weight. As a construct, the hajib is a particularly pertinent one in this respect, the intentions of adorning it are to help focus on internal beauty rather than its external manifestations – in a world where the media have constantly manipulated acceptable body imagery this comes as a refreshing change.

It is the courage of her convictions that make Amal such a strong and endearing protagonist and it is through her discussions with teachers, friends and family that she is able to arrive at and embrace her ‘identity’, however, wide or narrow that might be perceived as being by her compatriots.

“You’re here because you can’t believe how miserable you feel. In fact, right now it’s crushing you. And you don’t know how you’re going to get through it.”

Split between two narrative voices, those of Bella and Danny, “The Ex-Files” uncovers the feelings of rejection and loss following the end of a relationship and brilliantly charts the onset of changed behaviour and attitude that often follow. Balance is achieved between normalising these feelings – depicting the way people tend to be afflicted – whilst sensitively maintaining the individuality of both cases.

“The Ex-Files” themselves are a secret organisation led by the enigmatic Rupert and Juliette from the seemingly unlikely though remarkably homely environs of “The Copper Kettle”, a local tea-room serving fresh-baked scones. Keenly aware of the mentality of the ‘dumpee’ and of the power wielded over them by the ‘dumper’, Rupert and Juliette have established a professionally run organisation offering advice and a twenty-four-hour listening service.

The novel succeeds admirably in taking seriously and not devaluing the emotional-base of teenage relationships and therefore not downplaying the impacts of their demise. Readers become more and more involved in the stories of Bella whose seemingly sensitive and philosophical boyfriend Luc has fallen for Bella’s best-friend Andrea and Danny whose infatuation with Nicole has led to his being over-possessive thereby eventually losing her… As the stories unfold both guidance and reassurance are imparted through the maxims of the society: “As Rupert says, ‘Don’t let life happen to you – stay in control.’”

It is no surprise that when first relationships draw to a close, recipients within them can feel their world is eroding away. Having little experience to draw upon and to contextualise the depressing sense of loss can weigh especially heavy and appear unending. Through fiction Pete Johnson here deftly provides perspective. Not only should “The Ex-Files” be essential post-relationship reading, it is fundamental for all adults who have forgotten just how serious first relationships truly do feel…

I've always secretly believed that my pets could understand everything I said, and that it was my own ignorance of their language which made meaningful communication a problem. It seems Gabrielle Zevin has a similar inkling, since her latest book (just published in paperback) opens with a moving account of a dog's reaction to her teenage owner's death, and its frustration at not being understood by the remaining members of the family. My heart was immediately won over by this touching prologue, which sets the tone for what becomes a magical, philosophical and tender interpretation of the Afterlife.

Following the post-death journey of a teenage girl, Liz, who is killed in a hit-and-run accident, Elsewhere's title refers to a kind of alternative heaven in which people age backwards and eventually start all over again, coming back to Earth as babies. On arriving in Elsewhere, Liz goes through the inevitable stages of denial, bitterness and desperation before coming to accept her new (non)life. She finds her niche as a dog warden (people in Elsewhere have 'Avocations' rather than jobs) and discovers she has a natural gift for speaking canine.

A far cry from other prescriptive and clichéd (and often religiously weighted) metaphorical novels on death, Zevin has created an inspiring fantasy that encourages light-hearted contemplation on what would normally be a gloomy subject. Her airy, fluent prose conjures a dream-like, expectant atmosphere, and her engaging characters literally bring death to life. Elsewhere has all the ingredients of a classic teenage rites-of-passage, but with an elegant, original twist that sets it apart from the rest.

“When Bernardette first met Jonathan Heat, she thought of him as a kind of wounded saint, a man with the power to transform the lives of others, but tragically, never his own. Yet by the end, she’d come to believe that he’d led Sara into his own doom, deep into a mental illness, in the disguise of treatment; and finally to an extreme form of self harm, in which she was willing to sacrifice herself to feed his vanity.”

The ability of the media to mythologise the famous, renouncing notions of talent, value and of worth in favour of gratification that is instantaneous and immediately apparent lies at the heart of “Sara’s Face”. A caricaturised society is depicted where idiots are idolised and idols are made idiotic.

In Jonathan Heat, Melvin Burgess has penned the fatally flawed hero of a Gothic Romance, brilliantly transposing him upon the popular iconography of modernity. The story that surrounds Heat is one that is suffused with mystery and uncertainty. In a move that parallels the lives and levels of appropriation made common in the biographical detail of many an iconic star of our age, Burgess reveals in true tabloid-sensationalist-exclusive style the degrees to which the scourge of disposability and consumerist tendencies have infiltrated popular consciousness and indeed conscience. This is not so much one of Burgess’s alleged assaults on morals, but rather an assault on the types of assault morals have been assaulted by!

Within the context of comments on childhood arising through ‘children’s literature’ the novel challenges the manner in which the transition from childhood to adulthood is eroded and pushed back further and further by consumerist tendencies as market-forces have come to realise the weight and value of kid-coinage… Sara’s currency is her youth itself and subtle reference to the sexualised relationship she shares with Heat make for a deeply disturbing read in which her trust is continually abused.

“So, basically, we read your whole life story, Bindy, and PLEASE DON’T BE MAD. We felt guilty, but you say in the introduction that it’s a FAD assignment, so we are actually FAD. We ARE your life raft, Bindy, so we thought the LIFE raft should read the LIFE story. In case it would help with all those issues you were telling us about tonight.”

Think of the laughs with Louise Rennison… think of the angst in Jacqueline Wilson, then… think again! Jaclyn Moriarty is endowed with an all-too-rare ability not only to write convincingly using the voices of teenagers with their curious mix of laconic wit and personal anguish, but also to weave around this devilish plots that keeps readers caught dually between delight and deduction…

Alarmingly intelligent and precocious in the extreme, Bindy Mackenzie is seen as something of a fearsome individual by her peers. Readers of Jaclyn’s first two novels for teenagers “Feeling Sorry for Celia” and “Finding Cassie Crazy” will be familiar with the setting, Ashbury High and will find herein a number of old friends from these novels.

Bindy’s story is told in the form of memos on personal stationery that Bindy herself has created, e-mails to her mother and father and numerous other epistolary forms. Looking at the type of response Bindy receives from her parents makes one realise the crushing importance of communication between parents and child and the lack of meaningful interaction that modern ICT methods provide as a substitute for one-on-one attention.

Under the instruction of one Try Montaine, a seemingly liberal, left-wing teacher, Ashbury High has developed a new strand of study skill session called “Friendship and Development” (FAD for short). Initially sceptical of the lessons, Bindy writes several acerbic letters to the director of the Office of the board of studies, complaining that FAD distracts her from her studies.

FAD, however, is not all that it seems and is a clever subterfuge behind which a fiendish attempt on Bindy’s life is being made. In spite of this, the classes develop in Bindy and her classmates a real sense of union, care and understanding as each member of the group communicates themselves more fully and openly.

“Becoming Bindy Mackenzie” is life-affirming and touching without falling into the swampish grounds of sentimentality and didacticism. Jaclyn Moriarty has a wonderfully light, butterfly-touch that enables the consideration of deep and profound issues alongside points where the narrative flair is so witty that the book becomes almost too heavy to hold whilst laughing so loudly. This is a rollicking rollercoaster ride for the emotions, revel in it!

"It's going to be a long, hard, cruel winter, son. All the signs are there... It's going to be harsh and I don't think any of us will come through it unchanged."

Located firmly amidst the legend and lore of Lancashire, Joseph Delaney’s “The Wardstone Chronicles” are curios amidst the trend for series fiction. Whilst each of the stories is inter-connected, sharing at heart a base of the same characters, a ‘local-to-Lancashire’ setting and the premise that the dark is growing in power, each story also very much stands on its own.

“The Spook’s Secret”, the third book in the series sees Tom Ward learn more about his tutor, John Gregory and the types of personal experience with regards to love, life and trust that have served to influence his world-view. This is encapsulated in an epic struggle between the twin forces of good and evil as attempts are made to raise Golgoth, a pagan god of destruction.

It is the over-arching themes of the series that really cohere these books. The depiction of women and the types of cruelty that befall witches, the parallel constructs of child-development that explore issues of nurture versus nature focused on Tom Ward the seventh son of a seventh son who is apprenticed to be good and to banish malign influences from the county and upon Alice, a witch-child who forms an alliance with Tom and the types of person they will grow up to be as well as the flawed nature of the Spook himself and his prejudice gradually unfold throughout the series. It is interesting to track these through the books and to wonder how they will develop in future…

The advancement of the sciences and of technology form the backdrop to Malcolm Rose’s novels. “The Death Gene”, his latest, looks at the frighteningly real possibility of synthesising life, the profound impacts this might cause and the types of usage and abusage for which such knowledge might be appropriated.

The work of biologist Eve Perry provides a grim insight into the way scientific development is able to be used to wield power by extremists– whether political, military, religious or environmental in intent. The novel is split into two parts, the first sees Karl Stephenson and Finn Pallister entrusted with knowledge about bacterial synthesis, sees an outbreak of a new super-bug illness and the quest for its cure through utilising the bacteria’s ‘death gene’ a specially developed ‘self-destruct’ unit. The concluding part of the is novel an-against-the-clock race as an extremist scientist endeavours to destroy the ‘death gene’ thereby unleashing a deadly virus against humanity, a new, unseen weaponry.

"The Death Gene" is admirably wide in scope, it makes accessible the Nietzschean idea that 'God is dead', exploring the implications thereof to modern religion, to morality and the study of science and the need for an intrinsic set of ethics as part of that. The novel packs an uncompromising, and for many of its characters, an unforgiving emotional punch and is a potent reminder that scientific intelligence can only be utilised responsively by those with emotional intelligence...

“Never trust fairy tales. Any story that ends with “They all lived happily ever after” is a corck. There are no happy endings. No endings, full stop. Life goes on. There’s always something new around the corner. You can overcome major obstacles, face great danger, look evil in the eye and live to tell the tale – but that’s not the end.”

God of all things gruesome and gory, Darren Shan, returns with his highly anticipated third book in the Demonata series; “Slawter”. Readers of “Lord Loss” and “Demon Thief” will be familiar with the story of Grubbs Grady whose family has been decimated by an unfortunate inherited trait…

“Slawter” sees Grubbs and his uncle Dervish visiting the set of horror movie producer David A (more correctly Davida) Haym’s latest cinematic epic. Frustrated by obvious simulations of monsters, Haym has resolved to avoid such falsity in this work-in-progress.

Shan delights in pushing ideas to the absolute extremity, his demons are bizarre apparitions with fire in their eyes and snakes in their bellies. A burlesque romp about movie-making, there are few surprises in this story’s subtleties and narrative nuances are pretty much non-existent… Despite this “Slawter” remains curiously compelling, the interplay between the over-arching story and the meta-narrative of the movie creates that level of verve and vitality that Shan’s readers expect as standard. The movie dimension to the novel is entirely convincing as the prose is incredibly visual making this a perfect book to entice less confident or keen readers who will be left with a murderous appetite for more...