Speaking Pigeon English

Pigeon English

Pigeon English
Stephen Kelman

I keep seeing  Pigeon English  described, roughly, as the story of a young boy’s murder told from the perspective of an eleven year old boy, Harri. Initially, I started my review the same way. Then I realized that description isn’t all that accurate, and led me to expect something very different from what the book actually delivers.

So let’s start again. Pigeon English is about a young boy named Harri. Harri has recently emigrated from Ghana to London with his mother and older sister. His father, baby sister, and grandmother are still in Ghana, waiting to join the rest of the family. Harri is trying to figure out how to navigate this new world – learning the slang, making friends, fitting in, finding a girlfriend.

At times, Harri’s world is brutal. I mean, the story opens with a murder. Harri knew “the dead boy” as someone around the neighborhood, someone Harri wanted to be friends with, but never really got to know. Harri and his friend Dean decide that since the police don’t seem to be able to solve the case, they are going to investigate the murder, CSI style. They turn this into one of their many games, like jumping over puddles or acting like zombies. Of course, the stakes in this game are much higher.

At first, the dialect was a bit much. It took me probably 50 pages to figure out that “asweh” meant “I swear.” After a while I started to just go with it, since it seemed like a realistic portrayal of a young immigrant’s speech patterns (as far as I know, which isn’t very far). Harri’s language was jarring in other ways, too. His friends are incredibly homophobic, disablist, and misogynistic, and the language they use reflects this. This may be true to how kids talk and behave, but it was grating.

There are times when Harri’s sweet nature shines through. He remembers one time back in Ghana, when his mother was still pregnant with Agnes, his baby sister. He describes people hanging lanterns from their windows and fences during a blackout, making it look like stars all around. He tells Agnes:

“I fixed the stars for you! They’ll be waiting for you when you come out!”
Mamma: “Thank you, sweet thing!” (She did it in a tiny voice like it was Agnes who was talking.)

 One limitation of Harri’s point of view is that you are limited to brief snippets of what’s going on in the adult lives. I wanted to know more about the other characters. His mother is a nurse, and is having trouble at work. Aunt Sonia burns her fingertips to get rid of her prints so she can’t be deported.

One voice that did NOT work was the talking pigeon. Oooohhhhhhhhhhh, talking pigeon, please shut up! You are a pointless distraction.

Overall, this was a quick, decent read. Nothing remarkable, nothing awful. The Booker committee obviously liked it more than I did, as it was just shortlisted for the 2011 Man Booker Prize. Then again, I was not wild about any of the three longlisted titles I read, so maybe the Booker isn’t my cup of tea.

Adventure and Danger on the High Seas

Jamrach’s Menangerie
Carol Birch

This three part novel, shortlisted for this year’s Man Booker prize, is an adventure/coming of age/survival story focusing on little Jaffy, a London street urchin in the Dickens tradition.

Part one of the book deals with Jaffy’s life as a young lad growing up on Ratcliffe Highway, a poor section of London. As a lad of eight, he meets a tiger walking in the street, and approaches to stroke its nose. The tiger is not amused, and scoops little Jaffy up in its jaws. Of course, he’s rescued, and his encounter with the tiger leads to a job working for the titular Mr. Jamrach, a procurer of exotic animals. Jaffy enjoys working for Jamrach. He makes a frenemy is Tim, a boy a year older who does things like lock him in a shop overnight, nearly getting Jaffy fired from his second job at Spoony’s Tavern. Jamrach takes these young boys under his wing, making sure they have boots and schooling.

After spending a few years tending the animals, the story fast forwards to Jaffy going on an expedition to help capture a dragon for one of Mr. Jamrach’s wealthy clients. Jaffy volunteers to go as to not miss out on any of the fun that Tim is sure to experience. The boys will travel on a whaling ship, the Lysander, where they are expected to help hunt and harvest whales until the reach the island where the elusive dragon may or may not exist.

Jaffy learns a thing or two about sailing, and the superstition on the high seas. Some of the crew starts to voice their worries, and Jaffy realizes that:

The superstition of sailors is no more than the lone howling of miles between you and dry land and home, making you know that you are a thing that can die.

He’s going to learn that lesson pretty intimately before he finds his way home again.

Compared to how engaging the previous section was, part three felt like a bit of a throwaway.  Okay, survivors head home, they try to adjust, ho-hum, yadda yadda. I get that Birch wants to show how a person adjusts to “normal” life after going through a life-threatening, traumatic experience, but it just fell flat. Maybe that’s inevitable? I don’t know.

Overall, this was a decent read. There were just a few little things that bothered me. First, when they’re in the lifeboats, it rains a lot. They’re dying of thirst – are they catching the rain? Hopefully yes, but there is no mention of it. I wanted to scream at the characters – you can drink that! Quit telling me how it feels falling on you and get to collecting it! Just a simple sentence or two would have kept me from getting distracted. Something like – “The measly two inches of rain they were able to collect did not go far in satisfying their thirst.”

Second – I kept thinking about the Dudley & Stephens criminal case from the mid-1800s. “The Custom of the Sea” did not protect you from the law, even if public opinion was on your side. I just don’t know how accurate Birch’s portrayal of this part of the story was.  Although I really didn’t mind being brought back to my first day of Criminal Law, where my friends and I sat drooling over our professor. Ahem.

Lastly, the story was heavily borrowed from other sources. I already mentioned the nod to Dickens, but it is also reminiscent of the Man Booker 2002 winner, The Life of Pi, and of course, there’s Moby Dick (Jaffy’s love interest is Ishbel, for goodness’ sakes), and the real life sinking of the Essex. Most stories borrow from or are inspired by others, but I just felt it bordered on heavy handed and obvious here – but that’s just me. Birch certainly took the inspirations and wove them together in her own story, and it’s a fair contribution to this type of adventure story. 

Sorting through Guilt

A Cupboard Full of Coats

A Cupboard Full of Coats

Yvvette Edwards

Jinx is a thirty year old woman, still living in the house where her mother, Joy, was murdered 14 years earlier. She is emotionally cut off from the few people in her life – her ex-husband and her son. She works as an embalmer, a pretty solitary occupation. A Cupboard Full of Coats takes place over one weekend, when a former friend of her mother’s comes over to talk about the circumstances surrounding the murder.

Jinx isn’t interested, and initially pushes Lemon away. Over the course of the weekend, he wears her down, wanting to explain his role in her mother’s death. Right away we know that neither Lemon nor Jinx actually killed Joy. That was the work of her fiancé, Berris. Despite Berris being the murderer, both Lemon and Jinx feel guilty.

I was interested in this book especially after reading this article from the Guardian where Edwards recalls her editor telling her the book contained no white characters. Edwards said she couldn’t believe she had missed something so “glaringly obvious.” I admit, I wanted to know whether she had “fixed” this before the book was published, and if so, why? This actually ended up being a little distracting as I read. (In case anyone else would also be distracted, there is one white character, the mother of Sam, Jinx’s mixed race childhood friend. I think she has one line in the whole book). Normally I don’t pay much attention to the physical descriptions of characters, but I was looking for it here. Even if I hadn’t been specifically looking for the characters’ race, Edwards makes their skin tones a feature. Sam talks to Jinx a lot about color. Sam is obsessed with color. She is light skinned, and states she would never be with a dark skinned boy. This leads to a somewhat interesting sub-plot. Jinx is also observant when it comes to color. She is worried that her skin is too dark, especially next to her mother's.

The main plot, though – what really happened to Joy – is more frustrating than interesting. The mystery is slow going. Edwards drops hints about the night in question, revealing little bits at a time until all is finally revealed at the end. Everything is told in an extremely heightened fashion. It gets a bit melodramatic at time, and I don’t respond well  to that.

There are a few things I didn’t like about this book. First of all, Lemon just seems unrealistic. He shows up on Jinx’s doorstep, seemingly wanting to absolve himself of the guilt he feels, but at the end, he basically shrugs his shoulders and says

“It was her time, and when it’s your time, it’s your time.”

 I can understand this, but if he’s already come to terms with his actions, then why is he at Jinx’s door? Who is he to assume that Jinx needs him, 14 years later, to help her move on with her life? And why is it okay that he ignores her instruction to go away, because, of course, he knows what’s right for her?  He just seems to be a too-convenient catalyst for Jinx’s growth, especially since he just slips off without a trace.

Also, things seem to wrap up a little too conveniently for Jinx. She has realizations about her role in the murder, and learns that things were not as they seem. Okay, good so far. However, this resolution just makes it seems like perhaps if things had been a bit different, then perhaps Jinx would be culpable. This, to me, is unacceptable. Berris was at fault, the end. He was an abusive partner. If he hadn’t killed Joy on the night in question, then it most likely would have happened the next week, when she did something else to upset him. To make it seems that anyone but Berris was responsible feeds the cultural narrative that abused women are at fault for being abused.

And eeewwwwww, just ew, to the relationship between Jinx and Lemon. I get that people get together for various reasons, and sometimes people try to work stuff out through sex, but ew. I was totally creeped out.

All that said, I was bothered by the problematic elements because I think there was the potential for a pretty good book here. There are moments when you can see some it. Ultimately, though, it just didn’t deliver. Maybe it is a product of it being a first novel – I don’t know. At the end of the novel, it looks like Jinx is going to try to reestablish relationships with the people that are still in her life. I’d be interested in following Jinx as she matures, and in giving the author another chance, hoping that her style and skills mature as well.

Note: A Cupboard Full of Coats was longlisted for the 2011 Man Booker Prize.

What to Read Next

I'm down to four unread library books, which is pretty good. I had nine checked out at once just a little bit ago - that's a lot for me! Now my problem is deciding which one to read next. I chose three of these because they were available at my library and longlisted for this year's Booker Prize.

I can't remember why I chose Binocular Vision (Edith Pearlman). I put in a hold request for it, so there must have been a reason. It's a short story collection, and it looks pretty good. It's also the one due the earliest, so maybe I should start it.

Technically, I've started A Cupboard Full of Coats (Yvvette Edwards) already. I picked it up from the library on Friday, and then went to my favorite Chinese restaurant to order takeout. While I was waiting, I read the first couple of chapters. I didn't want to get too invested, though, because I was in the middle of two other books.

I've read mixed reviews of Stephen Kelman's Pigeon English. It looks like a quick read, though, so maybe I should just get to it right away.

The last option is Carol Birch's Jamrach's Manangerie. It appears rather interesting - a circus/high seas adventure. Not something I'd usually pick up, but that's why sometimes I like to read from some prize lists. I want to make sure I'm getting a good mix in!

Have you read any of these? If so, what did you think?