So read it I did, and it reads in much the same way as it got you to read it in the first place. Though I wasn't completely blown away, it was definitely an interesting and thought-provoking read. While dealing with some of the usual high school love story, and coming-of-age themes, it also surprises you with some less common details, questioning both the notion of what makes a proper family, and the nature of god, the afterlife, and organized religion. Plus, there's also the fact that the main character, Helen, is actually a centuries old ghost, who haunts a high school English teacher and falls for a boy in one if his classes.
The protaganist, Helen, one of the Light (a ghost--loved that name for them too, by the way), has been attaching herself to readers and writers of the ages. I'll take a moment right here to commend Whitcomb her excellent grasp of the lives and personalities of various famous writers and readers throughout the ages. She describes them affectionately and in detail, without even having to mention names (though occassionally I wished she would mention names, as my grasp of the lives of famous historical writers is much looser).Anyway, the reader meets up with Helen while she haunts a high school English teacher, Mr. Brown, who also harbors a passion for writing.
While haunting his class, Helen finds, quite suddenly and disconcertingly, that a member of the Quick (the living) can see her. Upon further exploration she finds that the living boy who can see her is actually one of the Light, James, who has taken over the body of one of the Quick (a boy named Billy). I don't want to give too much away here, but Helen and James end up falling in love, spurring Helen to take over a body of her own (a girl by the name of Jenny) so that they can be together.
In my opinion, this is where it get's interesting. Though Helen and James are technically the main characters, I would say that they and their interactions are slightly less original--though there is a certain level of complexity brought about by the fact that they're ghosts living in other people's bodys. James sort of struck me as your typical, polite, calm, knight in shining armor, with hardly any flaws to speak of. He almost exists simply to spur on Helen's developement. Helen is a little more interesting because of the constantly mingled fear and strength in her personality. She is portrayed outwardly as a timid person but on the inside she's really quite passionate.While we get glimpses of this passion mainly through her thoughts, the rest of the world only sees this in bursts, when her emotions boils over, which, I thought, rang true not only for a woman from another decade, but also for the shy, modern young woman she, for a time, pretends to be.
One of the main problems I had with Helen and James, though, was their relationship with each other. Though the fact that their souls are literally bare sort of makes up for it, it is a little implausible how quickly and deeply they fall in love. Though it seems as though Whitcomb means for this to be true love, it really struck me as more like love of convenience--James is the first other Light that Helen has seen since her death. It's not like she had a lot of options in the eligible bachelor department, yet she acts like she would have chosen him out of a million others. Needless to say I was a little underwhelmed by their whirlwind romance--I think, after centuries, Helen is so relieved to no longer be alone that she would have fallen for almost anyone. She just got lucky that she and James are so compatible. I think it might have been made for stronger character development if Whitcomb had taken a moment to acknowledge the fact that their relationship is flawed, so that it didn't seem to happen only by accident.
I'd say a relationship that was far more interesting was actually the one between Helen and her Mr. Brown, as she often refers to him. Her status as a spirit that he cannot see nor hear sets them up for a relationship that could not be explored in the real world, and I think Whitcomb does an excellent job with it. Helen's feelings for Mr. Brown are a strange combination of motherly protectiveness and the ardent, almost reverential affection and jealousy of a lover. Needless to say it was a very interesting relationship to follow, especially because it reminded the reader of Helen's duality--yes she is placed in a setting with adolescents, and even takes on the life of an adolescent for a while herself, but she is actually a grown woman.
Getting back to the other characters though, I have to say the ones who really blew me away were the characters who were absent--Billy and Jenny. You don't actually get to meet them, really, until the very end, but the way Whitcomb introduces them to you is so different and intriguing that I couldn't help but find myself more curious about their lives than the past and present lives of Helen and James. Since they're not actually around, Billy and Jenny can't tell you what they enjoy or what their lives have been like. You only learn about them in bits and peices through the interactions of their bodies (with Helen and James inside, and sometimes baffled) with the people they knew and loved. This introduction makes their lives all the more mysterious--though I have to say that, in general, they were already interesting characters to begin with. Whitcomb didn't slack and write unoriginal characters just because she had a more original way of introducing them. Billy, though he picks up on some of the bad-kid with a troubled past generalizations that can be found in many young adult books, still has an interesting enough home life to make him stand out. And, I would venture to say that Jenny is actually one of the more interesting female characters I've read in a while, despite the fact that I know little about her.
That was perhaps the only downfall of Whitcomb's choice to have such a complex set-up. Though she tells the story very well--giving you just enough about each of her character's lives so that you come to know them all--unfortunately, with so many characters, I sometimes felt a little like I was missing on the real story. Plus, there were somethings left relatively unexplained, like the spirit world and the outcome of both Billy's trial and the allegations brought against Mr. Brown.
Finally, I feel I have to touch on the way Whitcomb deals with family structure and religion in this book. Whether you usually seek out or avoid books with opinions on religion, I think this book would be a good read for you. Helen's view of religion, I think, is a good one to read about because though she seems to feel passionately about god, and clearly she has an inside view into the afterlife, she doesn't claim to know God's plan, nor does she force her views on others. Perhaps her best moments are the ones in which she clashes with Jenny's family and members of her congregation over their selfish and judgmental assumptions about the afterlife and about God.
I think these views went hand in hand with the books look at family. Jenny's family, from the outside, seems far superior to Billy's home life. But the book gives the reader a reality check, reminding us that just because something looks better on the outside doesn't mean there aren't problems on the inside. Though Billy and his brother are not your typical family, and they definitely face some difficulties, you can see, or at least James can see even if Billy couldn't, that there is a genuine caring and a tough love level of support between the brothers. Meanwhile Jenny, who's parents are upstanding members of their community, is being stifled by her parents, and soon she finds her parents are even stifling each other. And even then, Whitcomb surprises the reader, and reminds us that even "bad guys," like Jenny's overbearing mother, sometimes face their own crises and have to be examined again in a completely different light.
So, overall, though I have to be very selective about the books on my shelf (and I'll probably box this one--only the best of the best YA books make it onto mine), I'd have to say this is a book to consider having on your shelf.
No comments:
Post a Comment