Gary Collins’ new novel The Place [Flanker Press] comes at you full gallop.
Truly.
On page one, a draft horse, her hindquarters “stained with manure from sleeping on the barn floor” plunges down a narrow lane carrying a “gaudily bedecked rider with a plumed hat.” Brutally spurred, her tender mouth bit-yanked, the frightened horse lets loose “a profusion of steaming, pale-green buns.”
Hot horse whoopsie, eh b’ys?
Horse and rider are targets of a frenzied band of Orangemen yelling, “Down with the Cat’lics!”
It’s Orangeman’s Day, July 12, 1891, in an outport Place in Newfoundland and the Protestant population is celebrating, banishing the Catholic effigy.
Young Mike Kelly from the Catholic Place across the ridge, watches from the bushes as he hides in wait for an opportunity to meet with Ruth, his Protestant honey.
There’s a chance, of course, that if Ruth’s father catches Mike wooing his daughter, he’ll lash him with a buggy whip.
Ah, b’ys, once upon a time in Newfoundland religious prejudice, and its attendant strife, ran rampant.
Turn the page.
Turn 50 pages.
Colour me 50 shades of stunned because that’s the number of pages I’d read before I realized — hey, I’ve met Catholic Mike Kelly before. And that realization was despite chapter one’s give-away title: “The Catholic”.
After some pate-pawing, I flipped to the Acknowledgements and saw the author’s reference to “this prequel to The Crackie.”
Gar, b’y, it’s not your fault, but some of us are of ascending vintage and need even the obvious pointed out and p’raps also need to be gently shaken while the visibly obvious is underlined.
It took gunfire at Gallipoli to knock me on the noggin sufficiently to recognize I was reading about Mike, the Catholic, and Jake, the Crackie, the lad of hard upbringing who’d been placed in his cradle without being kissed.
Shame on me.
Interestingly, Jake’s mother, Rebecca, is the one character in this novel who gets to speak aloud, to tell her own story. And, b’ys, it’s a hard tale to tell.
You prob’ly recall (I didn’t until the smack in the head, so to speak) that Redjack, the Culler, has sexually assaulted Rebecca.
Rebecca has become pregnant and, knowing she needs a father for her child, has married Tobias.
And so on.
It gets complicated, but somehow everyone in the story is connected to the Place where Rebecca lives with her self-imposed (kinda) shame and misdirected hatred.
Mike, the Catholic, is Jake, the Crackie’s, friend. Rebecca is Jake’s mother although she barely acknowledges his existence. Redjack, the seasonal Culler, Jake’s biological father and a man carrying his own demons, occasionally returns to the Place. Eliza, the Maid, is Jake’s true love, Rebecca’s only friend, and is the mother of Jake’s newborn son, Templar.
Whew. Told you so.
Yet you’ll be entertained till after midnight sorting it all out, like that Greek buddy Theseus balling up twine in the labyrinth.
Sure, I’m mesmerized just drawing sketchy lines among the characters, and I’ve more than likely created a confusion as snarled as a kitty-pounced skein of yarn for you to untangle.
So, I’m going to talk of something else.
Several amusing comparisons — similes, I think stuffy ‘ol English teachers would call them.
First: Delighted to be marrying Rebecca, Toby struts around the Place “as proud as a saddleback with two herring.”
I lead a sheltered life. I hadn’t heard that description of puffed-up pride before.
Second: At Suvla Bay Jake praises Mike’s speed as a runner delivering messages on the battlefield — “Mike, b’y, you’re still slick as a tansy through kelp.”
Friggin’ tansies. Never caught a single one in my bay-boy youth because they…well, moved lickity-slick through kelp.
Third — which might partly explain why Redjack is such a nasty bugger: “Me ‘ol man,” says Jack, “dropped me over the gunnels, and dangled me baby feet, white as sea spume, making me wriggle me toes so’s to tow squid to the punt.”
Turn the page.
There was a time in a previous century, a decade and some after I’d learn to read when I’d shiver with excited anticipation if I discovered a new book written by one of my favourite authors — John Steinbeck, for example.
Books were scarcer in those days, it seemed, so if I happened upon a new Steinbeck paperback in a drugstore book rack I’d plank down my coppers, snatch the book and — nearly pissing my pants with expectations — tan ‘er for home and some top-notch reading.
Like many things over a lifetime, excitement wans, eh b’ys?
Yet…
…I feel a twinge of that long-faded excitement whenever I see a new Gary Collins book come down the chute.
Truly.
Thank you for reading.
TAG: Harold Walters lives in Dunville, Newfoundland, doing his damnedest to live Happily Ever After. Reach him at [email protected]
https://www.saltwire.com/lifestyles/local-lifestyles/book-remarks-christmas-in-newfoundland-373295/