Hello!
This week, I have read Furious Thing by Jenny Downham, from the YA Book Prize Shortlist 2020. Downham explores both the destructive and constructive natures of power and love in her novel. It is about emotional abuse, teenage angst, the power to protect and being able to ‘open the Forbidden Door.’
The novel is divided by three fairy-tale style chapters, ‘A Tale of Love and Death, Another Tale of Love and Death and a Third Tale of Love and Death’, written in the third person reflecting Lex’s own narrative: It opens with, ‘Once there was a girl who grew up wicked. She slammed things and swore.’ These two opening lines, especially the reference to ‘wicked’ set the scene for the link between Lex’s world and fairy-tales reminiscent of the wicked stepmother in Cinderella, the wolf in Little Red Riding Hood and The White Witch in Narnia. References to fairy tales run throughout ‘like a fairy-tale daughter’, a ‘fairy-tale wedding’ and ‘it’s the thing fairy-tales teach us’ contrasting the ideal that is expected of Lex with the reality of her disappointments and struggles.
The main story is written in the first person. Protagonist, Lex (Alexandra), is fifteen and furious, she articulates clearly: ‘I felt pure rage’. Her anger seethes, simmers and explodes; we are privy to her confusion, reasoning, actions and reactions. She explains that, ‘Anger was something to believe in when the world let you down. And I roared with it.’
Fuelled by her mother’s fiancé, John, who taunts her continually with ‘Why do bad things always happen when you’re around, Alexandra?’, Lex rages against her home, school and the people close to her, as well as herself. The events all play against the backdrop to the run up to the wedding of Lex’s mum and John and Lex’s GCSEs.
Lex experiences see-saw emotions, particularly in relation to John, who tries to supress, control and manipulate her. She describes trying to control herself: ‘His anger rippled in me. I felt it in my chest, live a wave. Don’t get angry, I thought. Be nice…’ and ‘I took a breath and swallowed my anger.’ Lex’s rage, however, manifests itself as ‘a bolt of steel running through me’ and ‘the reddest, hottest feeling’ as she physically throws a chair through a window at school and the ‘glass exploded’. Lex’s actions are a representation of her frustration, anger and confusion. These actions are misinterpreted, manipulated and overpowered by John, to his own end.
Lex’s relationship with her stepbrother Kass fluctuates between brother-sisterly love and romantic love. Their innocent friendship growing up depicts a childhood ideal where they ‘scrambled up trees and hid under beds’. For Lex, and to a certain extent, Kass, this becomes an attraction even after he has left for university. This is a reflection of her mother’s relationship with John, while supportive also has the capacity to be destructive.
Lex’s connection with her half-sister, Iris, expands as the novel progresses and it is shocking for Lex when Iris asks her to ‘Do your furious thing.’ and ‘Do your monster.’ These descriptions of her actions, as seen from a six-year-olds point of view, reveal Iris’s understanding of how Lex’s outbursts are to try and control a situation that is out of her control. The reference to Lex as a ‘monster’, links back to the theme of fairy-tales and the idea of ‘wicked’.
Lex’s Grandad was her refuge as a child. Scarred by her last day with him, she carries the weight of his death and remembers how he taught her ‘about knots and how to climb trees and everything I know about nature.’ She channels her deceased Grandad throughout and is connected to him physically through a ruby necklace where she often ‘asks a favour from the dead’ and prays, ‘Grandad…help me nail this.’ We hope, that somehow, Lex’s Grandad can reach out from the beyond grave and influence her situation.
As her mother’s wedding to John approaches, John’s power, control and abuse extends to her mother and Iris. Lex desperately reaches out for help and turning to: her stepbrother Kass, her mother’s friend Meryam and her son Ben, her stepbrother’s ex-girlfriend Cerys, John’s ex-wife Sophie and even Monika (the other woman from his office). You would hope that one person in Lex’s life could see past her rage to the real emotional abuse at play.
Lex is strong, courageous, wild and smart. Her journey is a rollercoaster where she tries to face her fears, ‘being groped by drunk old men or threatened with doctors or being told over and over there was something wrong with you.’ We hope, despite the setbacks, Lex will triumph as a heroine.
Themes: abuse, emotional abuse, bullying, manipulation, power, control, strict parenting, love, friendship, family, relationships
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