- Writing
- Plot
There is something innately interesting about the coming-of-age story. Its couched in many different genres, but there is something satisfying about seeing the young and green take hold of his fate and strike off on his own. Still, like any literary convention, it is nice to see an author willing to turn the whole thing right on its head. This is where we find Sara Levine, author of the humorous but thoughtful novel Treasure Island!!!
The nameless narrator and protagonist is a twenty five year old college graduate recording the events of her own adventure. The whole shebang is set off when she reads the Robert Louis Stevenson classic Treasure Island. The 19th century tale of pirates, adventure, hidden treasure, and pirates strikes a chord with the underemployed, suburban twenty-something and she decides to set sail for a new life. Boldness, Resolution, Independence, and Horn-Blowing are to be her watchwords in this new adventure, away from the boredom of middle class America and on to adventure!
Early on the novel is a series of comical misadventures as she tries to implement her core values, with results that are reminiscent of some early David Sedaris stories. The protagonist is completely lacking in self-awareness, using the four values of Treasure Island to act with blatant disregard for others. She relies on the material support of her boyfriend and family and takes anything else she feels she need. This leads to absurd scenes, as when she abandons her post at The Pet Library with her boss’s cash to buy a proper companion for her new life, a parrot. Upon her return she finds the cats eating the fish—which she left uncovered—and the rest of the animals let free by vandals.
Around the protagonist is a cast of mild-mannered, normal characters, with considerable, but not unlimited, patience for her antics. There is her boyfriend, Lars, who always tries to steer the girl in the right direction, but also lets her move in and use his credit cards for her every whim (for him “shaving cream, foot massager, new lizard watch band”, for herself “haircuts and eyebrow waxes and cheap Asian manicures”, and not to mention her sessions with, “Beverly Flowers Personal Healer”). Her friend Rena always has an open ear for her friend, though she finds no reciprocation on the other side of the table. Patty Pacholewski, whose collection of bracelets made her the most popular girl in fifth grade, now works at a sandwich shop and becomes an unwilling sounding board for our adventurer. The girl’s family is fairly typical, supportive loving mother, a kind but distant father, and a homely, chronically unappreciated little sister.
A coming-of-age tale, or an adventure story as she aspires to, commonly involves the rejection of familial/local bonds, the forging of identity, and leaving home, but Treasure Island!!! runs in the opposite direction. The protagonist ends up sacrificing her independence—losing her job, her appointment, her boyfriend—and reverting back to her family home, her old bedroom, and her old problems. Even her name, the thing most closely tied to how we identify, is never revealed, a problem which has harangued me throughout the writing of this review. Her identity is becoming tied to her relations, as a sister, a daughter, a friend.
As we transition to the latter half of the novel the story lets the levity of the early chapters give way to more earnest exploration of the core values. As the girl runs out of bridges to burn, her “boldness” begins to look more like lashing out. Meanwhile, revelations about her family tell a story of drama and intrigue. She, like many others, viewed her family home as a place of domestic ennui, a place from which to escape, but suddenly she learns that her family is caught in a drama in which she has no real part, and which makes her own problems out to be the domestic trifles against the adventures of her family.
In Treasure Island!!! is a defense against the solipsism of modern literature. It is not about escape, or treasure, or adventure. It is not even always about us. It is a smart book about that post-collegiate period, where despite all evidence to the contrary, there is an attitude inherited from books, movies, TV, and music promise the world is yours for the taking. Levine has torn down that façade and puts the hypocrisy on display for all to see. The irony being that, with stories like this, the world may just be hers for the taking.
Publisher- Europa Editions. The book is available now, $15. Buy local!
