Laughing Fire Press, September 14, 2015.
Three Stars
This is not your traditional ghost story – or really, any kind of ghost story at all. It is the story of a young teacher trying to do his best at an “F” school in Miami, a school in which the kids are more interested in surviving their often horrific home lives than in learning American History. The teacher and his students are essentially haunted by the legacy of a failing school system, and by their respective pasts. They are lost souls within the system, struggling to make sense of where they are and where they are going.
The events of this book are dark and disturbing, as the author contrasts events at the school – students jumping on teachers’ cars, verbal and physical fights in the classroom, potential sexual abuse by security guards – with those of his personal life, which isn’t much better. The dialogue is fantastically witty, although I felt like a bad person for laughing out loud in some of these scenarios. It is darkly comic in unexpected ways. And the characters, even the teachers who seem passionate about making a difference with their students, do such despicable things that it is hard to care about any of them, which may be the point. Everyone does bad things, and the teachers are no better than the students.
The main character, Luke, struggles to separate his personal and professional lives, especially when the extreme drunken debauchery of his weekends spills over into his weekdays. However, it takes him awhile to realize that his students have issues with their own personal lives, and that he can be there to support them or at least show them the way to a better future. He faces the challenge of teaching in an urban environment in which his students have no respect or desire for an education, and Luke vacillates between whether or not he can see the importance of it either.
Some of Luke’s personal issues were superfluous to the story, especially the side plot regarding his Mexican girlfriend. Although some readers have complained, the wild partying and bar scenes make sense (anyone would need a drink after facing these kids) in light of Luke’s age and cultural environment. However, I felt like some scenes were inserted just to push boundaries. Although Luke begins to make real connections with his students in a positive way, he can’t seem to do the same for his adult friends, whose immaturity rivals that of the eighth graders.
In the end, I was left feeling uncertain about the author’s motivations – is the novel about the failings of the education system, or the coming of age story of someone who just happens to be a school teacher? The message seemed to be that, with perseverance, Luke was capable of breaking through the tough exteriors of the children and truly educating them, but then he abandons it all. Is there hope for these kids – and their teachers – or not? I guess no one has the answer just yet.
I received this book for free from Thomas Dunne Books and NetGalley in exchange for an honest review.
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