Messenger. Virginia Frances Schwartz. New York, NY: Holiday House (Distributed in Canada by Thomas Allen & Sons Ltd.), 2002. 277 pp., cloth, $29.95. ISBN 0-8234-1716-6. Subject Headings: Silver mines and mining-Fiction. Single parent families-Fiction. Croatia-Canada-Fiction. Grades 7-10 / Ages 12-15. Review by Linda Ludke. **** /4

excerpt:

I knew from the start, from no sign in the outside world, that Ma would go on.

I am the one who was sent. My father's messenger. He who could no longer stay, sent me instead. For his was the voice that told me early to go to her.

To awaken her.

My need will be so sharp, my hunger so engulfing, that I will call her out of the darkness she has stumbled into.

She will know me by my cry.

Based on the lives of Virginia Frances Schwartz's mother and grandmother, this eloquent novel relates the struggles of a Croatian immigrant family during the 1920s and 1930s. Frances Chopp narrates the story, starting with her own birth. Her father dies in a mining accident one week before she is born. Frances believes she is her father's messenger, sent to pull her grief-stricken mother out of deep despair. Life in rural Cobalt, Ontario, is extremely harsh. Mining disasters claim many lives. With little food, isolation, severe snowstorms and floods, widowed families are like "spiders clinging to a web trying to stay alive." The Chopps decide to leave Cobalt for a better life, and, along with newly arrived relatives, they plan on running a boardinghouse in Southern Ontario. Through determination, grueling work, and the help of a loving, supportive extended family, the Chopps eventually prosper.

     The chapters are arranged in monthly and seasonal entries, similar to a diary. Frances tries to piece her family's history together and sees the past "stretched out behind me like a mystery road." She has a supernatural connection with her deceased father. Apparitions and angel visitations reassure her of his presence. As the youngest in the family, she often feels invisible. Her mother is so busy providing the necessities of life for her children that she nearly works herself to death. Frances never sees her mother smile and compares her to a sphinx, "all its feeling and all its treasures were shoved down into secret tunnels."

     Historical details frame the novel. The horrific working conditions for miners are detailed, including fourteen hour days, tunnel fires and kerosene tank explosions. The rich descriptions appeal to all the senses. In the factory town of Hamilton, all the residents hear the sound of whistles blowing throughout the day, signalling a change in shift. The ground shifts and rumbles with the passing of the Canadian National Rail freight train. The soot from the mills leaves a bad taste in everyone's mouth and coats the laundry left outside.

     The lyrical writing infuses the bleak landscape and conditions with a magical element. There are many references to omens, premonitions and superstitions. Poetic images abound, such as the description of the mourning time after her father's death, "for that time, no one has words, those days were like whispers."

     Fans of Schwartz's previous award-winning novels, If I Just Had Two Wings and Send One Angel Down, will be equally captivated by this moving coming-of-age story.

Highly Recommended.

Linda Ludke is a librarian in London, ON.

To comment on this title or this review, send mail to cm@umanitoba.ca.

Copyright © the Manitoba Library Association. Reproduction for personal use is permitted only if this copyright notice is maintained. Any other reproduction is prohibited without permission.

Published by The Manitoba Library Association ISSN 1201-9364

Hosted by the University of Manitoba.

 

NEXT REVIEW | TABLE OF CONTENTS FOR THIS ISSUE - May 7, 2004.

AUTHORS | TITLES | MEDIA REVIEWS | PROFILES | BACK ISSUES | SEARCH | CMARCHIVE | HOME