A High Wind in Jamaica by Richard Hughes

When we started planning the NYRB Reading Week, I had only one NYRB in my possession, and so I was determined to collect more. I then did some research to look for the most popular or most loved NYRBs. Two titles jumped out, which I promptly ordered from Book Depository. These two were A High Wind in Jamaica and Stoner. Reading William's review of Stoner has cemented my belief that I was right to choose it. And after reading  A High Wind in Jamaica I know now that this book well deserves all the love its readers have for it. It well deserves any accolade given it, I believe. My own meager addition to its accolades would be to say that Richard Hughes' book is easily one of the best books I've read this year (together with Hillary Mantel's Wolf Hall).

This is the part where I shall gush, because I do gush about books I love. And I love this book. This is the kind of book that I would love to ask my book group to read because it is so rife with things to discuss, to laugh about, to debate about, to question, to admire. I don't remember a book that has caused me to laugh out loud several times while I was reading it (and in public places, too, mind you). However, no matter how funny the book got, there were parts that shocked me and I like to think that I'm not easily shocked.

In summary, the book tells the story of the Bas-Thornton children, English subjects who lived with their parents in Jamaica. The children's ages range from 12-ish to 3 years old, and their childhood in Jamaica was the stuff that many children dream of--mostly free from adult supervision and, hence, full of adventure. However, a sudden hurricane destroys their home and the rest of the island that, for their own protection, the Bas-Thornton children and two other kids from a neighboring plantation, the Fernandez's, are placed by their parents on the next ship for England. The problem is, the ship the children are on are suddenly caught by pirates, lovable as they are strange. And hence begins an adventure for the children that they may or may not forget.

I say "they may or may not forget it", because the nature of children is an essential element in Hughes' book-- how it is so hard to tell what children may be thinking, how easy it is for them to forget, how their lack of understanding renders them extremely charming but also dangerous. The children in this book are never romanticized. The Thorntons (John, Emily, Edward, Rachel, and Laura) and the Fernandezes wreak havoc in many small and large ways in the life of the pirate ship and its crew. However, neither are the children demonized, like the boys from the Lord of the Flies were. They are difficult to understand and the true nature of their innocence is placed under a microscope, as Hughes so eloquently puts it here:

"Grown-ups embark on a life of deception with considerable misgiving, and generally fail. But not so children. A child can hide the most appalling secret without the least effort, and is practically secure against detection. Parents, finding that they see through their child in so many places the child does not know of, seldom realize that, if there is some point the child really gives his mind to hiding, their chances are nil."

Being a mother myself, that passage made me whoop with laughter. Not that my son or my daughter hide a lot from me (or so I think), but I think there's a lot of truth in those lines. Children, even if we were all them once, are not the easiest people to understand.

Emily, the oldest girl among the Thorntons, is the central character among the children, and she is a fantastic creation. She thinks nothing of the hurricane because it was not personal to her, but she is more impressed by a small earthquake that they experienced. She recovers quite easily from what would logically be a traumatic death of a loved one. Their capture by pirates was not a momentous occasion for her, but her realization that she was she was. The other children also have their own quirks: Edward and Harry eventually want to become pirates; Rachel, wants to convert all the pirates to good; and Laura, is the baby and, according to Hughes,

"...babies have minds which work in terms and categories of their own which cannot be translated into the terms and categories of the human mind."

Hughes does people his book with fascinating characters. The pirates, led by Captain Jonsen and first mate Otto, are charming because they are bumbling, admirable because they are occasionally competent and compassionate, and pitiful because they are at the mercy of forces beyond their control. In fact, all the characters in this book--major or minor--have a distinctive flavor and seem so alive (even if they may not end up so).

If this were only a funny book about a high-sea adventure, I don't think it would create that great an impact on me. However, even if there are many sobering instances throughout the tale, the end become more so and even slightly chilling. It seems a great feat, however, on Hughes' part to balance the hilarity with the things that can unnerve. And perhaps, partly in defense of his craft, Hughes makes one of his characters, the lawyer, say the following:

"...a criminal lawyer is not concerned with facts. He is concerned with probabilities. It is the novelist who is concerned with facts, whose job it is to say what a particular man did do on a particular occasion: the lawyer does not, cannot be expected to go further than to show what the ordinary man would be most likely to do under presumed circumstances." 

Initially, the quote above seems counterintuitive. But so does what A High Wind in Jamaica reveals about children and their world. And yet, everything that Hughes shows makes a certain kind of sense. So, yes, perhaps Hughes, the novelist, set out to present facts in the guise of fiction. As fiction, it is exciting, hilarious, entertaining. As fact, it is chilling and fearsome. Regardless, it is a book that I heartily recommend to  everyone, genre and serious literary readers alike.