Twitter-style summary:
Paul will commit
today’s event to the Memory, drink the Drink and when he wakes the Memory will
tell him what he needs to know. Or will it?
Part of the foundation of Catnip’s list is the strand of prize-winning
reissues we publish: Granny was a Buffer
(Carnegie); Song Quest (Branford
Boase); MapHead (Guardian). So it
makes sense to keep my eyes open for past prize winners that have dropped off
the grid. The Vandal is one such gem
– this 1980 Guardian prizewinner should never
have been out of print. The writer, Ann Schlee has had an adult novel (Rhine Journey) shortlisted for the
Booker and her insightful, intelligent writing is something that suits the sophistication
of today’s YA market.
The Hunger Games
might have softened us all up for combative dystopias, but The Vandal presents an altogether more insidious, disturbing
society in which the population entrust the day’s events to their own personal
Memory before they go to sleep at night after drinking the Drink. The next
morning the Memory delivers them the information required for them to go about
their day. So simple. So chilling.
The story follows one boy, Paul, after he commits an act of
vandalism – setting fire to a local sports centre – and his interaction with
the Father, his own family and the consequential punishment that follows this
indiscretion. I’m loathe to go into more detail about the plot as part of the
enjoyment comes from the ignorance with which you approach it. There’s a sense
of claustrophobia in the setting, a subtle mistrust as you find yourself
knowing more than Paul, yet knowing the past doesn’t mean you can predict the
future…
Reading The Vandal
felt a lot like the first time I read Lord
of the Flies or 1984, the feeling
that there are myriad ideas at play in what seems to be a simple set-up. Like
those well-remembered classics, this sparked a desire to really think about the themes that come into
play, of identity, free will, crime and punishment…
A perfect book for the burgeoning teen mind that hungers for
the exploration of the boundaries that this (non-dystopian…?) society places on
them.
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