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gemmak 's review for:
Jamrach's Menagerie
by Carol Birch
Any story of a sea voyage gone awry will always bring to mind the Ancient Mariner. The albatross forever around his neck, he must stop strangers to tell them his horrible story. Carol Birch is drawing from the same well of ships crewed by corpses, of offending the mysterious creatures that lie in the lightness deep. This novel is about Jaffy Brown's first and most disastrous voyage, in pursuit of a dragon-like creature known as the Ora.
Accompanying Jaffy are his best friend Tim and his hero, the weathered seaman Dan Rymer. They join the crew of a whaler called the Lysander, where they wake in the berth of the ship, coated in oil and whale grease. Birch never shies away from descriptions of the natural world, finding power and terror in the ocean and its beasts. When the crew kills its first whale, blood fills the ocean. It's a shocking, visceral image, echoed later in the novel with great resonance.
These are ingredients for a fantastic adventure novel, one that should leave you feeling like "a ghost on the god-haunted ocean". Birch has a sense for building tension,for stirring in intriguing spice, like Skip, the young shipmate who believes he is possessed of the second sight and can talk to the dragon. But, when the novel hits its crest, the ingredients fail to blend. Skip's madness is only foam, an obvious flavor that soon disappears. The major event of the novel, the one that should have the most emotional impact on the reader, is dissipated with too much language and too little insight. I don't want to ruin it for you, so I won't say what happens, but I will say this - it hinges on belief in Tim and Jaffy's friendship. But how do I know they're friends? I know because that's what Jaffy says. Even though the book starts in Jaffy's youth, including the moment he met Tim, I never get more than a gloss of what their relationship is. In fact, most of the book is like this for me, like garnishes meant to imply taste instead of actually giving it.
Enough with the food metaphors. This is not a bad book, only a mediocre one. It moves like waves, steady and consistent, but it's an adventure story. Sometimes, your pulse should race.
Accompanying Jaffy are his best friend Tim and his hero, the weathered seaman Dan Rymer. They join the crew of a whaler called the Lysander, where they wake in the berth of the ship, coated in oil and whale grease. Birch never shies away from descriptions of the natural world, finding power and terror in the ocean and its beasts. When the crew kills its first whale, blood fills the ocean. It's a shocking, visceral image, echoed later in the novel with great resonance.
These are ingredients for a fantastic adventure novel, one that should leave you feeling like "a ghost on the god-haunted ocean". Birch has a sense for building tension,for stirring in intriguing spice, like Skip, the young shipmate who believes he is possessed of the second sight and can talk to the dragon. But, when the novel hits its crest, the ingredients fail to blend. Skip's madness is only foam, an obvious flavor that soon disappears. The major event of the novel, the one that should have the most emotional impact on the reader, is dissipated with too much language and too little insight. I don't want to ruin it for you, so I won't say what happens, but I will say this - it hinges on belief in Tim and Jaffy's friendship. But how do I know they're friends? I know because that's what Jaffy says. Even though the book starts in Jaffy's youth, including the moment he met Tim, I never get more than a gloss of what their relationship is. In fact, most of the book is like this for me, like garnishes meant to imply taste instead of actually giving it.
Enough with the food metaphors. This is not a bad book, only a mediocre one. It moves like waves, steady and consistent, but it's an adventure story. Sometimes, your pulse should race.