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At a
glance, Daniel Handler seems to force the assumption that
his entire catalog of writings is simply a collection of fucked
up things happening to minors. Handler is, after all, the
nom de real life of Lemony Snicket, author of the acclaimed
youth novels A Series of Unfortunate Events. In them,
a…well…series of events which could be classified as unfortunate
occur to a group of young siblings. In The Basic Eight,
a group of high school friends fall victim to the unpleasantness.
The
Basic Eight takes place in a San Francisco-area high school,
and is written as the reworked journal of Flannery Culp, a
high school senior in prison awaiting trial. In this sense,
it's much like Hubert Selby Jr.'s The Room, minus a
significant portion of violent rape and torture. In order
to clarify her alleged misdeeds that have been, she claims,
skewed and sensationalized by daytime TV talk shows (purveyors
of human misery) and noted psychological "experts," she is
releasing her journal, with commentary, as a true crime novel
of sorts.
This
reworking of the past—by someone who clearly has something
to gain from it—begins to smear the timeline. Writing
a journal with knowledge of the future allows for a story
that has an unusually slippery feel to the narrative. Facts
and thoughts from the past are skewed and shaded by the thoughts
of the present and other events of the novel; at times, readers
are forced to question the veracity of the claims. Small inaccuracies
pop up, casting doubt on how much one can trust Culp. In certain
instances, the characters present at key events seem to change,
tarnishing the view that these events happened the way Flannery
claims.
In addition
to the mercurial nature of the novel's chronology, Handler
pulls a similar trick with the characters themselves. It would
be expected that Flannery would be enamored to her group of
friends, and as such paints a rosy portrait of them. This
can easily create doubt surrounding the goodness of these
individuals, leaving readers wondering if they'd want to spend
any time at all with them. People who are portrayed as wonderful
by the narrator suffer from severe bouts of shallow elitism
and occasionally are outright jackasses. Flannery is under
the impression that "The Basic Eight" are a group of fantastically
cool and school-ruling kids, but their actions and eccentricities
draw such a claim into serious doubt. I even found myself
asking, "Does that guy really wear linen suits to school every
day? Fucking ska drama kid rejects." (Note: Please do not
try to find any pictures of me in high school.) Even without
this superficial superiority, the characters still seem to
be the type of unbearable elitists who shit-talk all around
them, and only they are worth each other's time. This is because
elitism is only fun if you're the one doing it.
Since
the events of the narrative are intended to be public knowledge
(just as if Charles Manson wrote a book from jail, rather
than only those folk albums), readers are supposed to know
what happens, and there is enough foreshadowing and commentary
to know what's coming. Somehow, though, Handler's writing
manages to make that something seem new and unexpected. Despite
the foreshadowing, the novel feels oddly liquid. Times, events,
and characters seem to wriggle between the fingers of the
reader, which makes readers want to grab the narrative tighter.
It becomes more engrossing as it plays hard-to-get.
Handler's
prose feels new, refreshing, and exciting, and his stories
are engrossing and entertaining. Over the course of the novel,
Handler expertly alters the hue of the novel from one of light-hearted
teen-comedy humor, to black humor with an atmosphere of discomfort,
to an almost disturbing darkness. Since Handler is, as previously
mentioned, a fan of harm coming to children, The Basic
Eight doesn't shy away from causing grievous mental or
physical harm to its high schoolers; and the emotions of all
characters involved are horribly palpable near the end of
the novel.
(March, 2007)
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