The Wonder of Childhood and the Wisdom of Experience

Welcome to the weekend, and the end of summer, in which I might get more time to devote to this blog (maybe; I have to admit that lately, other things have taken higher priority). So today, a short post about a short novel: Neil Gaiman's The Ocean At the End of the Lane.

The story follows a boyhood encounter with a mysterious magic world that is full of peril for the mere mortal, leading him to experience a thrilling, strange, and terrifying adventure. It's framed by a middle aged man remembering this period of his life, and the entire story is tinged with a nostalgic atmosphere. It's technically a novel, but flows as smoothly and slowly as a short story.

Neil Gaiman is an experienced writer, and it shows. His language is air-tight, and he paints the secret, forbidden world with vivid detail. I won't give away much here, because I think it should be experienced first-hand, this introduction to this world. Gaiman also captures the psyche of an imaginative little boy wonderfully, full of the curiosity, wonder, and fear of an imaginative seven-year-old. While the story takes place when the unnamed narrator is seven, there is a sense of experience, of darkness, perhaps imposed by the presence of ancient beings, that may appeal more to older audiences--or precocious children. That said, anyone with adequate life experience to understand that things were different "back then" will take some enjoyment from the story.

In some ways, the tale subverts the genre of boyhood adventure, as he becomes scared an powerless the being and forces too great for him to overcome alone. His troubles begin and end with the Hempstocks, a family of women whose origins and existence remain a mystery. Another interesting point is that all the named characters are female, suggesting that it is these characters who are the real actors in the story--the boy is just along for the ride.

That's not to say that the boy's problems were purely fantastical. There's a not-so-subtle implication that his father has abusive tendencies, which is not explored further when the traumatic incident is snipped out of his father's memory. We get a sense of disconnect of the boy from his family, right in the beginning when he's moved out of his own small bedroom into his sister's. While he cares for his mother, he doesn't seem to be close with her at all. In all, the bland family situation, aside from the time when they rent out the boy's room to lodgers, is pretty run of the mill family drama type stuff. It's almost unfair how the boy's adventure seems that much more fantastic, as his family and his own life are so mundane.

Gaiman leaves us with incredible, beautiful, shocking, frightening images from this boy's encounter with the magical realm. I found myself verbally reacting to the turns of events of each chapter as the story revealed that the world of what could be called "magic" can be dangerous and scary, possibly resulting in existential threats. The language is perfectly immersive, the work of a master of his craft, creating a lasting impression on the reader. I finished reading the book about a week ago, and the story still holds fast in my memory. I will definitely read it again at some point.

In The Ocean at the End of the Lane, Gaiman presented a world that is vivid, wonderful, and terrifying that I had never seen before, a world within a world that follows its own logic. and this was the story of one little boy's encounter with it, and his death (or near-death) because of it. Because it is so perfectly constructed, I have to give it 4.5 stars.

Life After Life After Life

So much for the "Summer Reading Series". Apparently my summer got busier than I thought it would be, and the only book I had left unread lying around the house was Kate Atkinson's generally acclaimed new novel, Life After Life. The premise intrigued me, so I decided to pick it up some months back when it was actually new. While it's certainly a riveting story, there isn't a complete and satisfactory follow-through in the concept, and the story was almost too easy to read, lacking enough immersive prose replaced with exposition. (Atkinson is no Murakami, but come on)

This surprisingly breezy novel (considering it's over 500 pages) begins with the death of Ursula Todd, our protagonist. She dies almost half a dozen times in the first 100 pages of the novel, all before reaching the age of ten (except for the intriguing and gut-wrenching first chapter, strategically placed to pull you into the story). Her first few lives start out normal, but end tragically, and the next few, as she makes some unconsious changes in choice and circumstance, she slowly begins to improve her lot--and potentially those of the people she is close to.

But this isn't your usual reincarnation story: Ursula is born on the same date under (almost) the same circumstances in February of 1910, to the same family, living through both wars in most of her lives. She experiences a few horrors in some lives that she manages to avoid in others--but how she does avoid them is neither entirely clear nor consistent. Initially it is this intense, visceral fear that prevents her from making ultimately fatal decisions, and other times it's an unconscious enthusiasm to actively make a different choice than she had before--as if she wants to try something new.

The story is quite interesting and for the most part I was compelled to read further, if only to get to the point where she (spoiler alert) attempts to kill Hitler. The complex characterizations, and the funny way the other characters tend to stay the same no matter how radically their choices differ--and even Ursula, at her core, remains the same--are major virtues in this work. And while I'm no expert, and surely there are anachronisms, Atkinson portrays the particular era that Ursula lives--from the prewar 1910s to the London Blitz--with intricate realism that allows me to be there, not seeing it through a distorted black and white lens.

However, the development and execution of the concept fell short of expectations--of course, it's not that we need answers to everything. There are hints peppered throughout the novel that others experience this sort of recurring lives as well, and we don't need to know if there's a "set" number of lives or if it goes on forever... It was more in the lack of consistency in Ursula's apparent awareness of the phenomenon. At first it seems like she is becoming more aware of her deja vu, but then the oddly standout section "End of the Beginning," where past, present, and future blend together, she seems more confused in general than anything. Not to mention that killing Hitler, even if the fact that it may not alter history all that much, is kind of a cliche at this point--mind you, Atkinson handles this bit quite well. And there didn't seem to be enough moments where she was "aware;" I wanted this to be weirder than it turned out to be.

In the end, Life After Life is a story about a particular woman living in a particular era, and her active explorations in this cross-section of time and space as she tries to "get it right." It's as decent a read as they come...but perhaps not for the summer. Save it for when the weather is colder--this does take place in England, after all. 3.5 stars out of five.