The Children of Dynmouth

Rating:
Summary: The Children of Dynmouth
Review: An unsettling story, about young Timothy Gedge of Dynmouth, who frightens many of his neighbours, young and old, merely by spying on them and revealing what he knows. It's almost as if Timothy makes himself a sort of living receptor for all that is seedy in Dynsmouth, and then uses such knowledge for his own warped, juvenile aims. Specifically, Timothy wants nothing more in life than to enter a macabre performance in the local Talent Show, upcoming--but his idea of an amusing sketch is to re-enact several gruesome bathtub murders. When no one around him seems interested in helping him collect the various set-pieces he needs--a tub, some curtains, etc.--Timothy sees his performance-art dreams threatened, and even resorts to blackmail to get people to see things his way. And he knows every target's weak spot...the dark secret they want kept from family and friends.

Though Timothy starts to come off as an insidious blight on an entire town, when we learn the secrets he knows about other people, we learn that the people around Timothy are not so picture-perfect either; is he a wicked troublemaker, or more of a mirror that reflects the crusted underbelly of a small community? And when Timothy hints to another child that that boy's father may be a murderer, it is difficult to know if Timothy is even telling the truth. True or not, the damage is done. Suspicion and bitterness alter an innocent young boy's life forever, thanks to the infection of Timothy Gedge's words.

This is a creepy little tale, that becomes more and more thought-provoking as it skitters along. Some final passages in the novel indicate that the story should perhaps be taken as a look at a dangerous mind in early development, but I think there is much more going on than that. This tale is about all the people in Dynmouth.

Rating:
Summary: Would have been better as a short story...
Review: Clever but strange and sour tale of a deprived boy living in a crummy old seaside town, whose daydreams focus on his glorious appearances as a comedian on 'Opportunity Knocks'. He divides his time between watching the box in his absent mum's council flat, and badgering the townspeople, telling them about the darkly comic act which he hopes will win him the annual fete's talent competition, and finally blackmailing them into supplying him with the necessary sets and costumes! Don't be misled by the quaint little painting on the cover of the old British edition - this is an awful story, all about neglect, failure and delusion, though the curiously flat and unsubtle prose make it not quite as devastating as it really should have been.

Rating:
Summary: Dreary
Review: Well, maybe I'm not qualified to review this because I didn't finish it, but I tried twice, 6 months apart and both times I only made it about 40 pages and just couldn't continue. Maybe some people like this type of writing style, to me it lacked connection to real emotion or interest, and seemed like merely a ponderous exercise in the author's use of various writing techniques. Because it is a Penguin edition, and because I thought all Irish writers were great, I passed it on to my wife without any comment, thinking maybe she could appreciate something in it that I missed, but she had the same reaction.