For readers who remember the adventures of Shade, a silverwing bat in the Silverwing Trilogy——肯尼斯·奥佩尔 delivers with equal measure, the action-packed and compelling story of 将 Everett’s life in his most recent novel, 茫茫的.
Set in in the late 1800s, at the time the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) was being built, 将, who taught himself to draw when he was ill and bedridden for weeks, is looking for adventure. The only adventures he has had have been in his head or drawn in his sketchbook or lived out vicariously through his father’s letters from various rail construction sites.
When he arrives in Farewell, at the base of the mountain where his father is working, then 13-year-old 将 encounters the not all perfect and pretty but striking Little Wonder, a circus performer who is half Norwegian and half French. She taunts and teases 将 and “steals” his 大脚野人 tooth, then disappears. On his way to Craigellachie, where the final spike will get driven into the rail, the first of 将’s many adventures begins. A 大脚野人, a large hairy humanoid referred to as Big Foot in the United States, 袭击火车, and an avalanche nearly kills him and his father.
Three years later, aboard the Boundless, the brain child of the manager of the CPR, Cornelius Van Horne, 将 again crosses paths with the Little Wonder, whom he learns is actually Maren Amberson. She has joined the Zirkus Dante circus as a wire walker, working for the ringmaster, 一位名叫Mr. 多里安人. A lot has changed in three years. His father is now a railroad executive, and 将 now lives among the wealthy and rides in first class. He also has a reunion with many of the same people who were in Craigellachie on that day when celebration turned tragedy. Aboard the Boundless, “the world’s largest and most glorious train” (57), 将 learns about ambition, 贪婪, 魔法, social class disparity, 不公正, and the many shades of darkness–both literally and figuratively.
将 also gets to know a side of his father he didn’t know existed. 将’s passion is drawing; he is never without his sketchbook, yet his father forbids 将 to attend art school in San Francisco, calling his desire to become an artist a foolhardy experiment, one he won’t pay for. James Everett enc我们的ages 将 to instead use his talent and his mind on the railroad’s expansion, designing bridges and fleets of ocean liners, but 将 is not sure that is what he is meant 要做. In reply to 将’s argument, his father retorts: “的意思 要做? 这是无稽之谈. 男人做他想做的事 需要 要做, to make his way in the world, to support a family” (54). He wonders why his son would seek out poverty when better opportunities are available.
将 is afraid that his father sees him as too shy, 太过敏感, 太软, but by the book’s end, readers—along with James Everett—learn that 将 has a daredevil streak and a champion’s heart. At risk to his own life, 将 pays for the life-saving medicine that a boy in colonist class requires and draws him a picture of the beloved boat he had to leave behind.
将’s j我们的ney to maturity features murder, 盗窃, 消失的行为, and near-death experiences—enough adventure for a lifetime. He not only learns about the power of wonder versus knowing but also about perspective. About the fountain of 你th, Mr. 多里安人 says, “Why is it any more 魔法al than the sasquatch or the 沼泽地 女巫? You’ve beheld both with 你r own eyes. There’s 魔法 about these things. We may not understand them yet, but they’re part of 我们的 word, and anything that exists in the world is real” (230). And about the “poorest of the poor [who have] washed up on the 海岸 of 我们的 country to claim 我们的 land” (177), Mr. 多里安人 says, “My mother’s people are Cree Indian. Perhaps it’s possible people like 你 已经洗完了 我们的 海岸. A stimulating thought, don’t 你 think?” (177).
A mixture of historical fiction and 魔法al realism, Oppel’s book blurs genres and delivers to readers another hit. Despite its attempts at social commentary, at its core, 茫茫的 is an adventure tale laced with a smidgeon of love.
- 由唐娜发布