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paperback HK$48.00
Chameleon Press
More reviews by Christine Bruce
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Monday Redux by Robert Favole
"I feel like I'm gonna puke," says the narrator on the first page, starting his tale of a fateful Monday. This Holden Caulfield-style direct address signals to teenage readers that MONDAY REDUX is a book they can relate to. Rego Poppel is a 15-year old boy who finds himself unexpectedly in control of a sequence of events, and, like a video game player, he is permitted to replay the action in order to avert tragedy and arrive at the best outcome. But as he plays out different strategies he also experiences evolving definitions of his own identity and his role in the community.
Yes, this is a didactic novel. ROBERT FAVOLE, we're told in the blurb, has been both a lawyer and a teacher, and he has clearly called upon his knowledge and skills in these areas. Immensely readable as it is -- and it is a tense page-turner, no question about it -- this is a novel that could provide a whole term's work as part of an English or Social Studies syllabus. Through the clever technique of running radio and TV dialogues as "background noise" to the action, Favole sets up a modern Greek chorus that comments obliquely on the action. This becomes his vehicle for suggesting that media irresponsibility is part of the malaise in society that is the cause of the Columbine High school-type tragedy.
This is not to suggest that the story suffers as a result: the tension never lets up as Rego, through the cyber-age plot device of a "wormhole", is able to travel back in time, relive the events of the fateful Monday, and try out different "what-if" scenarios. Each time, Rego is faced with unexpected consequences of his actions and, as the risks to himself become more evident, fickle notions of "heroism" are challenged. Lance evolves in the best horror-story tradition from an insignificant companion to an evil genius intent on trapping Rego as an accomplice in his scheme.
Rego finally arrives at what Police Officer Santana describes as "a mature attitude", one which resolves most of the problems, gives him more confidence and gets him the girl. But this is no happy-ever-after tale. The final irony is that by thwarting the plans of the demonic Lance, Rego allows him back into his life to fulfil a vicious threat. The ending is chilling and dark. There are no simplistic choices: Mr Favole, like Rego's teacher Mr Baldacci, shows us that all we can do is try to "sort out the guidance from the confusion".
There are a few loose ends in this story: the significance of the farmer whose land Rego's house is built on, for example, is far from clear. A less-than-sympathetic portrayal of the teenagers' parents tends to turn them into quite ghastly caricatures, powerless, uninvolved and superficial to the point of being paper-thin. At times, Rego is a little too much a vehicle for the author's exploration of social and moral responsibility, while, for the general reader, the televised debate in Chapter 8 on media violence and gun ownership is a somewhat unsubtle bit of lecturing (though it would be loved by a teacher using it as a set text).
However, this novel combines topicality in a realistic setting with an up-to-the minute science fiction plot to produce an action-packed but thought-provoking narrative that is a welcome addition to the literature for young adults. While avoiding schmaltz and contrived happy outcomes, Mr Favole also steers clear of graphic descriptions of violence that this plot-line could have lent itself to. It is a book about the why rather than the what of Columbine-type tragedies, a book for thinking teenagers.
- Editor's note: Monday Redux is published by Chameleon Press, which is a company affiliated with the Asian Review of Books.
Christine Bruce
28/05/2003
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Christine Bruce teaches at the Chinese University of Hong Kong in the Faculty of Education, She works with teachers of ESL and promotes the teaching of English through literature to introduce language that is interesting and dynamic rather than merely a tool for transacting business. |
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