Do British people say "Elephant Boot"?

ONCE MORE UNTO THE BREACH

Roland Smith has a thing for elephants. It's not as disturbing and Paul Dowswell's aviation fetish, but a skim of Smith's bibliography shows many titles about animals, pachyderms in particular. Elephants are all right. I mean, they're humongous and have this incredible appendage that might be better than an opposable thumb, but I don't see the HOLY CRAP THIS ELEPHANT CAN TALK.

In my quest to accidentally read every YA book set in or around the Second World War, I was assisted by a student, to whom I recommended Wiesel's Night. He returned the favor by telling me about Elephant Run. 

"I read this book about a kid who was in the bombing of London during World War Two, and his mom sends him to Asia to be safe. And when he gets there, the Japanese invade. Pretty funny," he says. Yeah, I laughed my bleep off. But this is a kid who, if he doesn't like the book he's reading, chucks it into the street and watches cars destroy it. He also found Cormac McCarthy's The Road "hilarious". No surprise that he'd take sadistic pleasure in the misfortune of Nick Freestone, 14-year old boy and winner of the award for Worst Vacation Experience in YA Lit, 2009.

I regret not doing a visual review of my last blog entry, so this will be a poor replacement that sums up the plot of Elephant Run. Then, I finally get to complain.

Our young protagonist leaves this (and his mom)

for this (and his dad),

but falls right into this (with his dad),

and plans to escape like this (and of this I am jealous).

-The main elephant's name is Hannibal. Well-read dorks like me chuckle at this. Everyone else is clueless. I smirk in smug satisfaction and lose a dozen Facebook friends as a result.

-The budding relationship between Mya and Nick was somewhat ignored. All we know is that he notices her beauty and determination, but not much from her side. Too bad. I filled in by imagining that she hates his guts and pukes whenever he looks at her funny.

-There's so much authentic vocabulary in here that your head will spin. It both enhances the story and made me dream that I needed to buy a dictionary.

-Hilltop, the sage monk, plays a role akin to Gandalf, without the death/rebirth conceit. He's ancient, yet strong and stout of mind, has influence over leaders and wild animals, and is seemingly invincible despite presenting himself as a doddering old man. He moves the youngsters along by aiding their plans to fulfill their quest.

-Sonji, the sympathetic captor archetype, is a good character. I wanted more depth from him. The haiku motif stands out as a shining example of how to write YA.

-Nice dose of reality when Nick first arrives as a doughy city boy, and transforms into a lean young man who looks like a local. Even better: he's so engrossed in spying on the Japanese that he annoys his love interest. I lol'd.

-Somewhat predictable ending, but that's okay - much of YA is this way, and rightfully so, but Smith keeps the action moving and the tension high. HOWEVER, the action dips in some spots as some characters debate morals of the invading Japanese. Yeah, we get it, they're ruthless, but not Sonji. Cutting down on the ethical quandary could have kept this book moving. Doing the same to an episode of Star Trek: The Next Generation would reduce each episode to a five minute short in which Data says something socially inept, Picard adjusts his uniform and makes the right decision with no advisement, and roll credits!

-This guy knows a lot about elephants and shares in great detail. I remembered about zero of it. Sorry.

This book is worth a read if you're into historical fiction and learning about other cultures. There's adventure in exotic locales, espionage, elephants knocking stuff over, people riding elephants, daring escapes, samurai swords, and explosions, without any gushy romance getting in the way. NOW THIS IS A BOY BOOK.

Riding elephants is so badass they even did it on The Bachelor, America's best contribution to world culture.

Thanks, insane student! You shall be rewarded handsomely.

BONUS!

Because you didn't ask (why didn't you? I'm hurt), here are the finalists for the best-ever songs about elephants.

NEXT TIME, I YELL ABOUT

a book by a girl, about girls, probably for girls, that may just influence you to buy stock in GlaxoSmithKline. Let's just say that was as cryptic as the title of the book in question!

BORING STUFF

Elephant Run

Roland Smith

2009 Hyperion

Author Website

Nacht

I'm gonna puke. Photo by Steve Higgs

I just read Elie Wiesel's Night for the first time. I will now cry myself to sleep. The English edition is a brief read, and well worth the time. I have not read every published personal account of Holocaust survivors, but this ranks up there with Anne Frank's diary as a powerful first-hand account worthy being an introduction to the subject for YA readers. The dehumanizing effect of this text is (I hope) a new experience for these readers, and it will be a jolt. It's self-evident that every student should know about the Holocaust and its origins. Even this guy. But not to simply know of the depths of human evil and depravity, but to see the capability of our governments, and our collective responsibility to prevent similar outcomes. Whether you believe that this has happened, or that we're doing a lousy job, I don't care, because you're at least having the conversation. 

What's most disturbing to me is the denial and magical thinking of the people in Wiesel's community at every step leading to their arrival at the camps, from believing that the war would end long before the Nazis would arrive in their community, to when they were confined to their homes, shuffled into ghettos, shaken down for their possessions of value, and herded onto the trains. From a socio-psychological point of view, this is morbidly fascinating and worth discussion with YA students in a language arts and/or social studies classroom. What inspired this line of thinking, and how would students react in a similar situation? What does it take to get them to act on their own?

There has been controversy over whether this is memoir, fiction, or both. The spine of the edition I own says autobiography. We know enough about what happened in the towns, in the ghettos, on the trains, in the camps, that even if some of these details are imagined, they're not incredibly far-fetched. I'm inclined to agree with the Syracuse faculty member, Karen Hall, who said, that the "literature of trauma" is invariably subjective: “For me, then, ‘Night’ is 100 percent true in its call to readers to remember the Holocaust, listen to and learn from its survivors, and never to allow such an event to take place again." Autobiographies and memoirs are inherently inaccurate, as banked memories fade or distort details, or are skewed by perspective. That should not lessen the impact of this book.* This leads  to a more abstract discussion about truth, fiction, and the ramifications thereof, that concrete YA readers might not be able to grasp, but could work with a more sophisticated group. 

Boring Stuff

Night, by Elie Wiesel

Latest edition: 2006 Hill & Wang

New translation by Marion Wiesel

Amazon

 *Look, the line spacing changed and I don't care to fix it!