By Marsha Forchuk Skrypuch
Dare I admit that I have a knee-jerk reaction to the verse novel? Maybe it’s because there have been so many of them in the last few years. Or maybe it’s because writing a novel in verse seems so pretentious.
I suspect the real reason is because I could never write one myself. Superb verse novels slap me with my own anxieties as a writer.
But I have looked boldly into the face of two recent Canadian novels in verse for young people: Karma and burn. Neither is pretentious, and both are compulsively readable. Once you’re plunged in, you forget you’re reading verse.
I was intrigued by Karma because of the recent buzz about the touring of Lost, The Play, based on Cathy Ostlere’s first book, Lost, A Memoir (2009), a true story about the author’s search for her missing brother. The one-woman play adaptation debuted in Calgary in fall 2010 and has been touring the country to rave reviews ever since. It plays at the Winnipeg Theatre Exchange from January 19th to Feb 5th.
Karma is a lush novel about Jiva (nicknamed Maya), a Canadian teen whose mother was a Brahman and whose father is a Sikh. The novel opens with Maya on a commercial flight to New Delhi. Beside her sits her father, and on his lap is a paper-wrapped box containing the ashes of Maya’s mother Leela, who recently committed suicide, so desperate was her need to escape the isolation of Canada’s prairie. Maya thinks the purpose of the trip is to scatter her mother’s ashes in the land of her birth, but she discovers to her horror that there is another reason as well. She is only fifteen, yet her father’s family has found her a husband.
The story begins in October 1984, on the eve of Indira Gandhi’s assassination by her Sikh guards and rampage of Hindus murdering Sikhs that follows. Maya and her father are barely settled into their hotel room when they are engulfed in the violence. Suddenly, Maya’s mother’s suicide and her father’s betrayal seem trivial.
Her father abandons his turban and cuts off his hair and beard in an attempt to disguise the fact that he is a Sikh. He leaves Maya at the hotel on her own, telling her to wait for him. But her hotel is set on fire. She must escape.
Karma seduced me from page one, but at this point in the story, I could barely breathe. Maya cuts her hair and dresses as a boy. It isn’t a good disguise and her risk of exposure as either a Sikh or an unaccompanied girl or a foreigner could mean death or worse. She flees the burning hotel and plunges into the chaos of the streets. When she manages to board a packed train she lulls herself into thinking that perhaps she may be safe, but further horrors await. Here is an excerpt (page 149-150 hardcover edition):
Mirage
They come across the yellow fields
running with dark faces and teeth bared
through ribbons of heated air
a mirage of false water.
The train slows as if waiting for them to catch up.
What’s happening?
Why are we stopping here?
Is it wolves?
(we should have prayed for wolves)
but men instead
four-limbed and angry
carrying iron rods and knives
hands gripping gasoline cans
voices shouting into the hot dry air
their fury stirring the dust like a wind.
(we should have prayed for wolves)
They slam their bodies against the slowing
train. They cling to the window bars. They
climb to the roof and throw people into the air.
A voice demands we unlock the door of our
carriage. Open or be burned!
I tell myself I’m still sleeping:
the unwound turban meting out
punishment
a gang of men severing the body of the
prime minister
the pounding of their fists
on this train
on this car
are only hammering
the metal walls of my head.
Open or be burned!
We must save ourselves! someone cries.
But it is no dream
my hands and arms know
my nostrils know
even my lungs and
my shallow breaths
know
what my heart cannot fathom
know
what’s going to happen next
because in dreams you cannot close
your eyes and mine are shut tight.
Will we save ourselves!
The door opens
Oh my God. Who unlocked the door?
Ostlere’s stripped back verse reveals a nuanced world of castes, poverty, violence, stereotypes.
Midway through the novel, Maya is mute from trauma. The point of view switches to diary entries of Sandeep, an orphaned teen who was adopted by the family who rescues Maya. He wants to help her find her father, but he knows that by doing so he will lose her for himself. The choices he makes and the journey they take together explore deeply the concept of karma.
This novel will stay with you for a long time after you’ve finished it. A masterpiece.
***
Alma Fullerton’s burn immerses the reader into an entirely different world than Cathy Ostlere’s Karma, but the verse format is just as effective. In Karma the action is set into motion with the loss of a mother. So too in burn, but in this story, the mother abandons her new husband and two daughters to revive her singing career.
burn is told from the point of view of adolescent Casey. The family had recently achieved a few years of stability, with Casey’s rock star mother marrying her high school sweetheart. and settling down, but peace is dashed when Casey’s younger half-sister Ginny is diagnosed with autism.
The story opens with the tension of a mother on the verge of explosion, a step-father who copes by absenting himself, and Ginny’s need for absolute routine. Casey balances between everyone, trying to please others in order to hold her own precarious position in the family.
Casey’s mother does the unthinkable: she ups and leaves. John retreats further into red wine and late nights at his restaurant, avoiding his daughter Ginny’s needs and delegating her care to his wife’s older daughter. Casey willingly picks up the responsibility because she loves Ginny and she needs to demonstrate that she is useful. Casey’s deepest fear is that John will abandon her, just like her mother did.
Casey can manage Ginny better than anyone else, but she is just a kid herself and she has her own troubles with bullying, fighting, and pyromania.
Fullerton’s spare words paint a stark picture of the adult responsibilities that make up Cassie’s daily life. She is fiercely protective of her sister and wants to do everything she can to keep Ginny happy, but the burden nearly breaks her. Here’s an excerpt (pp. 70-73):
Sunday Morning
“Eggs.”
I force my eyes open.
“Ginny.”
She’s standing over me. Her face
two inches from mine.
“Sunday morning. Eggs.”
“Ginny, it’s seven a.m.
Go back to bed.
I had a late night.”
“Sunday morning. Eggs.”
“Go back to bed!”
“Sunday morning. Eggs!
Sunday morning. Eggs!”
Ginny smashes her head
against mine.
“Crap, Ginny!”
I shove her away, covering
my forehead with my hand and
roll out of bed.
Ginny sits at the table,
her plate, fork, and a knife
already laid out.
“You gave me a headache.
Thanks a lot.”
“You’re welcome,” she says.
I roll my eyes,
“When someone says
‘Thanks a lot’ with that tone,
you don’t say ‘You’re welcome.’
They’re being sarcastic.”
“After thank you
comes you’re welcome,” Ginny says.
Mom taught her that.
“Not with that tone.
You need to learn to read tones,” I say.
I CAN read!
I CAN READ!”
Her forehead gets redder
every time she yells.
“Yes, you can read.
Hold this on your bump.”
I press a cold cloth to her head
and look in the fridge.
“Sunday morning. Eggs.”
“We have no eggs,” I say.
“SUNDAY MORNING. EGGS,”
Ginny screams.
She rocks in her chair,
yelling,
“Sunday morning,
EGGS.
Monday morning,
OATMEAL.
Tuesday morning,
PANCAKES.
Wednesday morning,
BAGELS.
Thursday morning,
FRUIT.
Friday morning,
WAFFLES.
Saturday morning,
CAPTAIN CRUNCH.
“SUNDAY MORNING,
EGGS!’
Ginny is NOT
going to let this go.
I’m going to have to take her
to John’s restaurant for breakfast,
— on Early Seniors’ Sunday.
“Damn it to Hell.”
burn hit me in the gut. It does not take long to read this slim novel, but the emotional impact is deep. We’ve all met troubled kids like Casey, and it is easy to judge and blame, but Fullerton forces us inside her head and we feel what it’s like to be her. I was in tears by the time I reached the last page.
I am in awe of Alma Fullerton’s ability to paint her story with simple bold strokes. Fittingly, a painting by Fullerton graces the cover of burn.
Both Karma and burn straddle literary and commercial fiction. Their spareness make them perfect for reluctant readers, but even the most sophisticated book-a-holic will be challenged by these gripping narratives.
Karma | Puffin Canada | 517 pages | $22 | cloth | ISBN #978-0670064526
burn | University of Toronto | 180 pages | $12.95 | cloth | ISBN #978-1897151952
5 Comments
Thanks for noting _Fishtailing_, Jocelyn! Unsurprisingly it is a favourite of mine too… another one I loved is _The Apprentice’s Masterpiece_ by Melanie Little (Annick Press).
That’s exactly how I feel about verse novels Marsha, but have been afraid to admit to it. So thank you for stating it so well, and for making me want to read these two books. BTW, another good verse novel is Wendy Phillips’s “Fishtailing” which won a GG in 2010.
Jocelyn, I did read Fishtailing and enjoyed it as well. It was an eye-opener to read a number of really good verse novels!
I’m a huge fan of novels in verse, Marsha, and have read dozens and dozens. Thanks for the recommendations. I’ll add these to my list. Looking forward to MAKING BOMBS FOR HITLER even though it’s not in verse. ^_^ Have you read THREE RIVERS RISING by Jame Richards? Historical fiction written in verse.
Angelina, historical fiction in verse? Must read Three Rivers Rising. Adding it to my list now.