Overview
I am dying: it’s a beautiful word. Like the long slow sigh of a cello: dying. But the sound of it is the only beautiful thing about it.As life slips away, Gabriel looks back over his brief twenty years, which have been clouded by frustration and humiliation. A small, unforgiving town and distant, punitive parents ensure that he is never allowed to forget the horrific mistake he made as a child. He has only two friends - his dog, Surrender, and the unruly wild boy, Finnigan, a shadowy doppelganger with whom the meek Gabriel once made a boyhood pact. But when a series of arson attacks grips the town, Gabriel realizes how unpredictable and dangerous Finnigan is. As events begin to spiral violently out of control, it becomes devastatingly clear that only the most extreme measures will rid Gabriel of Finnigan for good.
Synopsis
SURRENDER is a mesmerizing psychological thriller from extraordinary novelist Sonya Hartnett.
I am dying: it's a beautiful word. Like the long slow sigh of a cello: dying. But the sound of it is the only beautiful thing about it.
As life slips away, Gabriel looks back over his brief twenty years, which have been clouded by frustration and humiliation. A small, unforgiving town and distant, punitive parents ensure that he is never allowed to forget the horrific mistake he made as a child. He has only two friends - his dog, Surrender, and the unruly wild boy, Finnigan, a shadowy doppelganger with whom the meek Gabriel once made a boyhood pact. But when a series of arson attacks grips the town, Gabriel realizes how unpredictable and dangerous Finnigan is. As events begin to spiral violently out of control, it becomes devastatingly clear that only the most extreme measures will rid Gabriel of Finnigan for good.
Publishers Weekly
In another eloquently written, heartrending novel, Hartnett (Thursday's Child; What the Birds See) plunges readers into the story of a young man facing the end of his tormented life. Through flashbacks and shifts in narrative voice, 20-year-old Anwell's recollections of the events that have brought him to this point slowly and painfully come to light. As a child, his distant and careless parents gave him the responsibility of looking after Vernon, his mentally disabled brother, and a terrible mistake in judgment results in Vernon's death. Anwell, now referring to himself as Gabriel, is paralyzed by grief and imagines his mother, in particular, is "making an island" of him. His only friends are a feral child named Finnegan with whom he makes a Faustian pact, and his dog, Surrender. As Finnegan begins to menace the town with arson, Gabriel must stand by and watch until he realizes he has in fact surrendered his soul. The pace of the novel is almost excruciatingly measured until the heart-stopping conclusion that, in retrospect, is manifest throughout the tale, attesting to the quality of the storytelling. Readers are left to grieve for an angel child, compassionately portrayed, engaged in a tug-of-war with evil and despair. Hartnett's novels may never reach the widest audience of young readers, but those who find her work will be moved by her gifted writing and the powerful changes her characters undergo. Ages 14-up. (Mar.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.
Editorials
Publishers Weekly
In another eloquently written, heartrending novel, Hartnett (Thursday's Child; What the Birds See) plunges readers into the story of a young man facing the end of his tormented life. Through flashbacks and shifts in narrative voice, 20-year-old Anwell's recollections of the events that have brought him to this point slowly and painfully come to light. As a child, his distant and careless parents gave him the responsibility of looking after Vernon, his mentally disabled brother, and a terrible mistake in judgment results in Vernon's death. Anwell, now referring to himself as Gabriel, is paralyzed by grief and imagines his mother, in particular, is "making an island" of him. His only friends are a feral child named Finnegan with whom he makes a Faustian pact, and his dog, Surrender. As Finnegan begins to menace the town with arson, Gabriel must stand by and watch until he realizes he has in fact surrendered his soul. The pace of the novel is almost excruciatingly measured until the heart-stopping conclusion that, in retrospect, is manifest throughout the tale, attesting to the quality of the storytelling. Readers are left to grieve for an angel child, compassionately portrayed, engaged in a tug-of-war with evil and despair. Hartnett's novels may never reach the widest audience of young readers, but those who find her work will be moved by her gifted writing and the powerful changes her characters undergo. Ages 14-up. (Mar.) Copyright 2006 Reed Business Information.VOYA
From the gripping cover showing a raging inferno to the blood-chilling revelation of the final chapter, this page-turner is a blistering yet dense psychological thriller. The similarities with Pete Hautman's Invisible (Simon & Schuster, 2005/VOYA August 2005) are eerie: outsider young men with mysterious friends; a fascination with fire; strained, past-the-breaking-point relationships with parents; shadowy hints of past tragedy; and romantic humiliation sparking the final conflagration of violence. Set in a nowhere town in Australia, this story of Gabriel portrays a young man recovering from an unstated illness under the care of his aunt. Gabriel's chapters alternate with those of his friend Finnigan, a wild child of the countryside. Gabriel recalls meeting Finnigan, their adventures with Gabriel's dog, Surrender, and his confrontations with his parents. He remembers his mentally handicapped brother, Vernon, whom Gabriel killed by locking him in an unused refrigerator. This act is both the horror of his history and the harbinger for the violence to come. It is a dark ride into the territory that only authors like Robert Cormier once dared to enter. Winner of the Vance Palmer Prize for Fiction (presented by State Library of Victoria, Australia), the book echoes in some way another Australian award winner, Martin Zusak's brilliant I Am the Messenger (Knopf, 2005/VOYA February 2005) with its beautiful, often oblique, sometimes frustrating, but ultimately rewarding deeply layered prose that will attract readers who enjoy a challenge like moths to a flame. VOYA CODES: 5Q 2P S (Hard to imagine it being any better written; For the YA with a special interest in the subject; Senior High, definedas grades 10 to 12). 2006, Candlewick, 256p., Ages 15 to 18.—Patrick Jones