Child Gone Wild: A Book Review

As published in StarTwo, The Star on 15/5/2009



Turning tricks
Review by TERENCE TOH


Lullabies For Little Criminals
Author: Heather O’Neill
Publisher: Quercus, 373 pages

TWELVE is always an awkward and confusing age to be. It is the borderline year between the innocence of childhood and the angst of the teenage years, the portal to puberty, an age of self-discovery and wonder.

Turning 12 is the first step on the way to adulthood and can be a turbulent point for many of us.

Especially so if your life is like that of Baby, a precocious young girl living in the slums of Montreal. Raised by her father Jules, a heroin addict and part-time quilt salesman, she finds herself constantly shifting houses, moving from foster homes to detention centres to homes of relatives, often coming across shady characters.

Despite her obvious intelligence, her background and broken family history conspire to deprive her of most opportunities and so, partly out of necessity and partly out of choice, Baby turns to prostitution, servicing a great deal of eccentric and sleazy customers drawn to her youth and innocence.

Baby soon finds herself leading a double life: going to school and playing with friends in the daytime while doing heroin and serving customers in cheap hotels at night. As can be expected, however, Baby finds both halves of her life clashing.

Lullabies for Little Criminals is a publishing sensation in Canada, nominated for many awards and winning several, including the Hugh McLennan Prize for Fiction. Because of its many accolades, I was therefore a little let-down to find that the book did not meet my expectations.

Author Heather O’Neill’s character Baby has been compared by critics to Holden Caulfield, protagonist of J.D. Salinger’s classic The Catcher in the Rye, as both are young people coming-of-age in a world that they are lost and jaded by.

Since I have not yet read Salinger’s novel, I cannot make a comparison but O’Neill’s book reminds me more of the characters from the 2003 film Thirteen, starring Evan Rachel Wood and Holly Hunter, due to the similarities in themes. But while the characters in Thirteen destroyed their lives in gripping and dramatic scenes, Lullabies for Little Criminals goes in the opposite direction, drawing us into the protagonists’ exciting life with slowly paced honest confessions and Baby’s whimsical musings.

While this is by no means a bad thing, I am not sure if it is the right tone for the book; there is little suspense or tension, even in the more sordid scenes of drug abuse or prostitution. To use an analogy: O’Neill’s novel felt a lot like the film Jurassic Park acted out by the cast of Barney the Dinosaur.

Her writing, however, is fantastic. She writes with deep honesty and there is a strange poetry to her sentences. One of my favourite parts of the book is when Baby reflects on the social workers assigned to her case: “It is important to hate the people who work in child welfare if you want to protect yourself from their prognosis. You have to think they are idiots. Because when they say you are troubled and a delinquent, you need to be able to laugh in their faces.”

O’Neill stated that when writing her novel, it was her goal not just to describe Montreal but to describe the city the way she saw it at age 12 and at this, she succeeds admirably. Places and objects, as well as memories, are depicted in a dreamlike quality, which is the novel’s main charm.

The downside of this approach, however, is that her characters come across as slightly unrealistic at times. Most of O’Neill’s characters are either completely forgettable or extremely unlikeable, and Baby herself is no exception. While it is clear that she is mostly a victim of her circumstances and just like a baby needs love and affection, some of her thoughts and actions throughout the novel are rather intolerable, making her cross the line from pitiable to detestable.

The relationship between Baby and her father however, is rather well-drawn. Jules is a sympathetic character. Having fathered Baby at a young age, he is clueless when it comes to raising his young child, yet tries to do so to the best of his ability. Both Jules and Baby recognise that their unusual relationship is affecting their lives for the worse. Yet they choose to stick together, as they are parent and child, and this bittersweet relationship is one of the highlights of the novel.

All in all, Lullabies for Little Children is a good read, but not a great one. While it is written beautifully with moments of brilliance, its lack of a gripping story and cast of mostly one-dimensional characters prevent it from being a great read.

THE SILENCE OF WONDERLAND

Yes, I'm blogging again!

Heh, the reason for this is because I somehow agreed to join a writing project started by my friend Lydia Tong.

Basically, every month, they give you a phrase or a theme, and you write a story based on it.

This months theme was 'Álice in Wonderland'.

Now, you know how much I love Alice in Wonderland, particularly as I am a huge fan of the creepy horror game American McGee's Alice. So I think I had a bit..too much fun with this story?

My story inspiration: what if Alice in Wonderland was done in the style of The Silence of the Lambs?

The Red Queen

“It’s good to see you again, Ms. Chesire.”

I offer my hand; she graciously refuses it. Instead, she embraces me tightly; and I find this tiny gesture warming my heart. It is hard to believe, but this spunky ex-prostitute is the closest thing I have to a friend in this messed-up hellhole.

“Oh Alice, why are you always so formal?” she teases me. “We have first names for a reason, you know. Never call me that. Makes me sound like a reject character from some Jane Austen novel.”

“Alright, alright,” I smiled. “If that’s how you want it, Cathy.”

It is crowded in the White Rabbit café today. It is lunch hour, after all, and the place is filled with employees of all kinds, from sweepers to secretaries, all chatting and stuffing their faces with the café’s famous chicken pies. Waiters are friendly and pleasant. Recorded music, most of it swing music from the fifties, floats through the air.

Ironic we had to choose such a pleasant place to discuss such a gruesome topic.

I order tea, she orders a Coke. For a while the meal is fun; but alas, all good things never last. After catching up on each other’s lives, exchanging shopping recommendations and discussing the FINE ass of the cafe’s head waiter, I ask her the inevitable question.

“What do you know about the Kampung Selamat murders?”

Cathy smiles. Amazing, how even as we discuss such a brutal wave of murders, she still remains bubbly. This girl is perpetually happy: it would take nothing less than a nuclear warhead to wipe the smile off her pretty face.

“Oh, I have some very interesting info,” she says coyly. “My contacts in the criminal underground have tracked down a person who you might find..interesting.”

‘Tell me more.”

“This guy’s messed up. Mind more shaken than a tornado in a blender. A former delivery boy in a spare parts workhouse, used to live in Kampung Selamat. Abusive mother, father dead. Druggie, resident in the Bukit Aman Hilton three times, twice for indecent exposure, once for lewd behaviour. Previous resident of Pattaya, but recently moved here last year. Got to know him through a friend in the illegal drug and hormone business.”

‘Ladyboy.” I hazard a guess.

“Brilliant, Holmes,” Cathy is impressed. “Born Rex Hong, now calling himself Regina Crimson. Pre-op transsexual, apparently saving up to fully walk down the paths of estrogen.”

‘Why do you suspect him?”

“Guy lives in the same area as most of the murders. Acts strange, keeps to himself. Mostly silent, and when he does talk, its to people only he can see.”

“Worse of all,” Cathy lowered her voice as she told me this, enjoying the dramatic storyteller role she was playing. “The guy brings back strange packages in his van every night. Odd things, wrapped in newspaper, a lot of times bloodstained. Awfully suspicious. Freaking creepy. Either the guy is the world’s messiest fishmonger, or he’s been cutting up more things than his dangly boy parts.”

“I..see.” I cannot help but be disturbed. “Thanks for your information, Cathy Chesire. I’ll look into it.”

The meal ends soon after that. I pay for both our meals, say goodbye to my friend, and drive back to the Taman Ajaib Police Station.

This just could be the lead I’m looking for.
________________________________________________________________________________

I suddenly realise that all through this narrative, I have yet to introduce myself, and I apologize profusely. I’m not always this rude. It’s just that recently, with in the wake of such ghastly murders being committed, my mind has been extremely flustered.

My name is Alice Lee. Well, Special Agent Alice Lee if you want to be precise, but please don’t call me that. Its so long, and overly dramatic. Such a X-Files sound to it, and everyone knows the only good thing about that show was David Duchovny. Man, he was really hot. All guys look good in black suits. And ties. Fact of life.

Now, sorry, where was I? Oh yeah, my introduction.

I am a special agent with the police force, assigned to the Department of Curiouser and Curiouser Crimes. Don’t ask how I got the job. Seriously. Long and convoluted story. My task is basically to investigate unusual crimes, those that seem the work of particularly deranged or twisted individuals, and bring such monsters to justice.

I’ve seen a lot of freaky stuff in my day. There was the case of the murderous Tweedle twins, for one thing. Remember? That slaughter festival that terrified the nation last year? It was me that tracked down those gluttonous scumbags. Me who freed their hostages. Me, indirectly, who persuaded them to shoot each other. Me who had to attend ten weeks of psychiatric counselling after that.

And there was the Hitomi case. Remember? The one that minister got involved in? Don’t ask me which one, they look all the same to me. Corrupt pharmaceutical company mashing up poisonous mushrooms and caterpillars, mixing it with hookah to form the ultimate hallucinogenic drug. Lepido, they called it. I inhaled some of it, and was spouting rubbish like ‘AEIOU’ and feeling like my head was constantly shrinking and growing for a week. Nasty stuff.

There are too many cases to mention. The mad rituals and child-kidnapping of the deranged religious cult, The Walrus and Carpenter, led by the insane Old Father William. Mohd Mazhur Hatta, aka The Mad Hatta, and his poisoning twenty people at his tea reception.

As my mind wanders, my hand instinctively reaches for my left hand, which is now marked with a long and curvy scar. A souvenir from my time with the notorious knife-wielding killer ‘Jabberwock’, who even now still remains at large.

Mine is a tough job. But I’m the only one qualified for it.

______________________________________________________________________________

Rex’s, or should I say, Regina’s home, looks perfectly normal from the outside. Serial killers are not supervillains after all: the last thing they want is for their homes to draw attention to their true natures.

It looks almost cosy. French windows, a slanted red roof, with an Astro signaller perched on it. A balcony on the second floor, with chairs and a tiny table. A somewhat unkempt garden of bougainvillea plants and various other shrubs I cannot identify. I’m an agent, not a botanist, after all.

Normal police officers would come back with a warrant and demand to enter. “Section 16 of the Criminal Procedure Code, I’m a policeman, let me in by the hair on my chinny-chin-chin,” etc. But that way, in my experience, never works. And I’m not that kind of police officer.

I am hardcore.

So I leap over the criminal’s gate, raid her shed to pick up a rake, which I use to smash a large window. Because the shrill ring of a doorbell is really irritating, as it is.

I find myself in what appears to be a hall of some sort, and its massiveness impresses me. One could park two cars in this room and still have space for a piano.

Various paintings, most of it classic art, adorn the walls. Wall-cupboards and shelves are many. A large looking-glass is hung next to the window I enter. A large cupboard, full of ceramic animal figurines, such as flamingos and hedgehogs, stands in a corner. The hall is messy: chairs and tables standing around at random places, various articles of female clothing scattered all over it.

(Very nice female clothing too, I must add! Especially the nice green top lying on the wardrobe! Such a lovely cut, and such a wonderful tone! It would match completely with these jeans I have at home! Man, this Regina Crimson may be a gruesome trans-sexual serial killer, but he/she sure has great taste in fashion.)

Croquet mallets and balls are stacked in a pile at another corner of the room. A small table is placed nearby, on it are a pack of playing cards, as well as tea-cups and a plate of tarts, half-finished. Beside that, on a shelf nearby, a lovely vase of roses, in a lovely shade of ruby red.

WAIT.

Something is not right.

The roses. I walk up to them hurriedly, and pick up the vase. There is something not right, something un-natural about their colour. Forensics would help me get me a definitive answer, but there was no time for that now.

I plucked one, only to be shocked to find my hands stained with their colour.

These were white roses- painted red!!

And I was no pathologist, but the thick, sticky texture of the liquid staining these flowers could only be one thing.

Feeling ill, I placed the vase back, my heart beating like crazy. Calm yourself, Alice, I told myself. You’ll get out of this. You’ve faced worse, and survived..

It was just then I realised a noxious, foul odor in the air, a smell so rank not even the fragrance of roses could block it out. I wanted to gag. Wanted to puke. Wanted to run away, as far as possible from that disgusting smell.

Instead of running, I stayed, however, and my eyes were drawn to the wall-cupboard located above the vase.

I knew I would not like what I saw within them. And yet, I still opened them.

Five human heads stared back at me through their empty eye sockets. Completely unpreserved, flesh was rotting off some of their cheeks, while blood and guts were still leaking from the spots on their necks where they had been cruelly severed from their bodies. One of the heads was now a hotel for worms, which squirmed happily in a gaping hole above where its nose would have been.

I knew I had just found Kampung Selamat Murder Victims 1-5.

My heart felt like it would explode at the magnitude it was now beating.

And it was just then that I heard a laugh.

To my horror, I turned to see the Master/Mistress of the House staring at me, a wicked smile on its face. "You have a pretty face," it said softly. "I want one too."

Rex Hong. Regina Crimson. Tall, imposing. A hideous parody of a woman. There was not a hope in hell this thing could pass as female: its body was too big, its shoulders too wide, jaw too clenched, face too masculine. Yet it desperately tried to ape the fairer sex, dressing itself in the trappings of a woman: a low-cut dress of deepest scarlet, high heels, a tacky gold necklace hanging over it’s flat chest.

A crown of silver sat on its head, resting on its long dark tresses. Rex/Regina’s face was covered in makeup of every kind, there was more paint on its face than in an art gallery full of Rembrants. Yet all that makeup could not suppress the anger that contorted the psychopath’s features.

I instinctively reached for my gun as Rex/Regina picked up the croquet mallet in the corner, and stalked towards me, furious. I was trained for these events. I was ready. But the killer was just too fast for me. I could barely scream as it lunged at me, swinging its mallet furiously, screaming and cursing.

The last thing I heard before I passed out:

OFF WITH HER HEAD!!!!!!

finito