Julian Comstock is actually the story of Adam Hazzard. Adam is eighteen and a member of the working class (i.e. slightly above indentured servants but certainly below aristocrats) living in a small, Western town. He spends his days working in the barn of a local aristocrat family, the Comstocks. where he is taken under the wing of the Comstock family’s son, Julian. Unlike everyone else in his family, Julian eschews the religious rigor of the day and crosses class lines to befriend Julian. The two spend many an hour discussing religion and politics, that is, until the army comes to town looking to forcefully conscript its young men. Knowing they’ll be sent to distant Labrador to fight in long, bloody battles against the Dutch, the boys look to escape. They do, but only for a time. There comes a moment when they need to decide where to put their energy—religion, politics, and everything else around it as war rages on.
If there is anything Julian Comstock does not only well but exceptionally well, it’s capture authorial voice. I struggle finding positives in other areas of the novel, but if Wilson can be commended for anything its highly precise prose, and the 19-20th century American tone that emerges from it. The narrative first-person, one can feel Hazzard living in a yesteryear USA when words were more formal than today.
The other positive, specifically for young men, is the plotline. It involves getting the girl. It involves war. It involves righting wrongs. It involves standing up for what is right. It involves coming-of-age. It sees evolution pit against Christianity. There are ideological battles between authoritarianism and democracy. For adults it is overtly juvenile, but precisely for young adult males, it may hit a sweet spot. For adults, the plot is paint-by-the-numbers (save the climax) and possesses painfully obvious moral dichotomies. Not to say adults cannot enjoy it, rather expectations for simpler plot and characterization should be set.
I struggle with the novel’s sub-title “A Story of 22nd-Century America”. I ultimately believe Wilson made the right choice in choosing to set the story in the future given the elements in play, but I question how much effort was made to make the story feel future-esque. To be clear, there are no rules that state a novel set in the future must be futuristic—flying cars, laser guns, etc., There is nevertheless some expectation that things will be different; the fact that Wilson chooses to go retro-history is not in itself an issue. What I take issue with is that the story is for all intents and purposes the Civil War set in 2023. There is geopolitical realignment and slightly different religious demographics, but everything else is Abe Lincoln’s America—technology, travel, war, etc. The novel just as easily could have had an alternate-history label. So while the premise of the setting is that the world has collapsed post-oil, nevertheless, the reader would expect certain advances to have survived…
And my struggles with the novel continue. Regular readers of this blog know I am not one to jump on the feminist horse and whip it into a froth. But I have to take issue with Calyxa’s characterization. The book’s morals are so black and white that when the two mix it creates a contrast. In other words, Calyxa is on one hand a “strong woman” who is able to stand up for her beliefs and values in the face of the strongest opposition. And yet on the other, she is a simpering maiden—a damsel in distress—who requires assistance when certain other stressing situations present themselves. The result is an inconsistent character who, in a more literary novel may not feel out of place, but in such a simplistic plot ironically feels like a sore thumb. The scene running from her brothers under Adam’s protective wing was eye-rollingly bad…
In the end, Julian Comstock is classic boys’ adventure, for better and worse. Simplistic to say the least, most things play out as might be expected, but are not without action and excitement, romance and personal tension. Wilson is on sharpest point with prose, bringing the Civil War-esque scene to life, telling a tight, flowing, escalating tale in the process. All else, well… The book is recommended for YA males, and adults who enjoy such level books.
No comments:
Post a Comment