Part Three VI, VII, VIII, IX, X, XI, or "The Ghost and the Grimdarkness!"
Trigger Warning: I don't really have a good handle on when or where to use trigger warnings, but there's a rape scene in this part of the book, and I'm going to discuss it, so I figure it's only fair I make that clear up front. It's Part Three, Section XI, so the segments before that are fine. Well, relatively speaking...
Fortunately, it's only Livejournal, so no one's even reading this anyway. But in case internet archaeologists are reading this a thousand years from now, because this is the only surviving literature from the 21st century, I just want them to know what they're in for. Also, future historians, I just want it on the record that J.K. Rowling was a terrible author.
VI. As expected, Simon Price has dumped his stolen computer just in case the police come after him. What I didn't expect was that he dumped it into a river. That might be the best way to go. I've never destroyed incriminating evidence before, so I couldn't say whether this is a good move. He certainly couldn't burn it, and anything sneakier would have probably been beyond his competency. The problem here is that it's probably too late. Everyone has seen the message on the Pagford Parish Council website accusing him of stealing computers. And for all Simon knows, someone might stumble across the remains of the computer in the water. I really hope this doesn't happen, because it would be really, really dumb, and totally up Rowling's alley.
Also, this book is set in 2012 or so, and yet this computer seems to be a desktop. I don't think the model has been specified or anything, but Rowling made a big production out of how hard it was to hook up, and when Simon told his son to un-hook everything, he made sure to remind him to get all the cables and such. I know desktops are still available, but it seems odd that Simon would go to all this trouble for kind of computer that's been declining in popularity. Then again, that low demand may have been what made it so easy to steal. And Simon's the kind of guy who steals almost for its own sake. His kids already have laptops, as I recall. But in his mind, having a "family computer" in the living room makes him more respectable, and getting a heavily discounted stolen computer makes him even more respectable, because in his mind all the important people in the world take shortcuts. To him, a guy who doesn't buy stolen goods is a sucker.
All that remains is to pull the accusation from the Pagford website. I'm just gonna call it "the website" now, because it seems to be the only one of any importance in this novel (besides Facebook), and I'm sick of trying to remember the full name of it. Just remember that this is a slapped-together geocities-style affair, primarily used as a bulletin board for small-town governance. Andrew Price was only able to hack the site because it was so badly put together, and the administrator has never had to cope with a security breach of this scale. In fairness, it's not like anyone would have expected it to come up, either.
In case anyone's just joining us: Barry Fairbrother.... is dead. That shouldn't matter to anyone, but he was important figure in his community, and the whole point of The Casual Vacancy appears to be an up-close examination of the Barry Fairbrother-shaped hole in Pagford, United Kingdom. Beyond his personal affairs, the biggest fallout of his death is that it opens up a vacancy on the Pagfrd Parish Council, and a special election is going to be held to fill his seat. Craven opportunist Simon Price sees this as a way to get sweet bribe and kickback money, but his son Andrew fears that their family will be humilitated when the public finally sees what a craven opportunist Simon is. So Andrew hacked the website, exploiting the fact that Barry's account hadn't been deactivated yet. Changing the username to "The Ghost of Barry Fairbrother," he posted an anonymous screed against his dad, hinting at all his crooked business dealings.
So far, all it's gotten Andrew is a fat lip. Simon has no idea who posted the message, but he routinely abuses his family anyway. Simon thinks it's Shirley Mollison, since Shirley is the admin for the site, and at the very least she's responsible for moderating its content. Also, Shirley volunteers at the hospital where Simon's wife, Ruth, works. And Ruth let slip that they recently got a new computer. Furthermore, Shirley's husband is the head of the Parish Council, and her son Miles is running against Simon for the vacant seat. So there's motive, means, and opportunity right there. Of course, Shirley's the one who tipped the Prices off to the message in the first place, but that could have just been her covering her tracks.
In any event, Ruth calls her and convinces her to take the Ghost Message down. Andrew observes his mom's behavior on the phone, and feels more disgust than pity. He's reached a point in his life where he can no longer view his parents in black-and-white. He's always despised his bully of a father, but he's starting to resent his mom for enabling that behavior. She apologizes for him even though he beats her, she tries to talk him out of things when it would be wiser to stay quiet, and she stays quiet when it would be wiser to speak out.
But this is all victim-blaming. Ruth could just as easily loathe Andrew for antagonizing Simon against his better judgement. Andrew fantasizes about kicking his dad's ass someday, but he's not exactly weightlifting or preparing himself for an ultimate confrontation. Instead, he smokes and sasses his father constantly, which frustrates his mom as much as she frustrates him. He doesn't understand why she doesn't just leave her father, but it's never going to be as simple as that. Ruth might just as unfairly wonder why Andrew doesn't come to her aid when Simon beats her. Ultimately, it's a lot easier for them to argue with each other, since they know it won't come to blows.
MEANWHILE, Rowling steals my schtick in order to switch to Shirley Mollison's point of view. I always wished she would do this with the Harry Potter series, but she insisted on sticking almost exclusively to Harry's P.O.V. whether it made sense or not. Now, with no single protagonist, she's got no choice, but it's inconsistent. Sometimes she sticks to one character for an entire Roman-Numeral Section, but this time she's shifting with nothing more than a new paragraph. Anyway, Shirley doesn't even know how to delete posts from the website, so she digs into her notes from that computer class she took years ago. "She did it only becase Ruth, whom she liked, had asked her to; she felt no personal responsibility in the matter."
I suppose that line is meant to demonstrate Shirley's hypocrisy at work, since, as the admin, she absolutely is responsible for what goes on the website. In other words, she's proud of herself for running the thing when it works, but when it doesn't work, that's everyone else's problem. I suppose that fits her character, except that she's extremely fixated on social status, which was why she maintains the site in the first place. To her, it's a way to demonstrate that she's even more impressive than she would be as merely the matriarch of the Mollison family. I have a hard time believing that she isn't just as mortified by this hack as Simon Price. Then again, we're not done with "The Ghost" just yet.
In any case, taking the post down doesn't change much, since others have seen it and won't easily forget. This is Rowling's excuse to shift to Parminder Jawanda, who has printed it out. Ironically, she thinks this is the work of Howard Mollison, just as he suspects "The Ghost of Barry Fairbrother" is the work of Parminder's political supporters.
She takes this up with her allies, Colin and Tessa Wall, over dinner. Tessa is probably the only one even remotely familiar with Simon Price, and she points out that "The Ghost" was likely telling the truth about what a creep he is. Parminder is determined to make this about her struggle with Mollison, and suggests that he'll target Colin next, since Colin is also running against Miles Mollison in the election.
Vikram, Parminder's husband, wonders aloud why Howard doesn't try to get on the more powerful District Council, if he's the cartoonish supervillain his wife makes him out to be. Vikram doesn't follow politics, and maybe that's why Pagford's elite respect him more than the squeaky wheel that is Parminder. She explains that Howard is too tied in to Pagford to want anything bigger, and besides, he has allies on the District Council anyway. In her mind, Aubrey Fawley works for Howard, when it's probably more like the other way around, at least the way Howard would probably see it.
What's probably stressing Parminder out is the whole dust-up about Catherine Weedon's death. I'm still fuzzy on whether Parminder actually did something wrong, but the scrutiny bothers her nonetheless. And on top of that you've got some anonymous informer spilling secrets where anyone can find them.
But Colin's on a whole other level. Everyone in this book is too engrossed in their own problems, but Colin still manages to stand out when it comes to making everything about himself. What might "The Ghost" say about him, he wonders with terror. And this is where I get a little confused.
See, Rowling does a quick flashback to establish what he's so worried about. Before he died, Barry wrote an article about the Fields, a slum that's become a political football in the local area. The newspaper plans to run the article, along with an interview with Krystal Weedon, who Barry had held up as an example of the promise of supporting the Fields community. We haven't gotten a lot out of this subplot, but it's been percolating behind the scenes all book long. Anyway, the newspaper calls up Colin Wall, because he's the principal at the school Krystal (sometimes) attends. Presumably, this was just a routine fact-checking deal, but as soon as Krystal's name comes up, Colin becomes agitated.
"Had he touched her?" is the unanswered question in his mind. He recalls his psychologist telling him not to dwell on these sorts of thoughts, and we learn Colin is taking Prozac to cope with this sort of anxiety. But the thing is, what's Colin really worried about here? Did he actually do something wrong, or is he merely afraid that voters will find out about his crippling paranoia? The problem with Colin is that he's so self-conscious that I can't be sure. All we do know is that he's now convinced that Howard Mollison is out to get him.
I don't know if Rowling is being coy or not. If she is, I have to give her credit for it. If Colin really is molesting his students--so many students that even he cannot keep track--then it's better to drag that revelation out. This book already features drug addiction, spousal abuse, child abuse, and self-harm. If Colin's a sex offender, then it could easily be lost in the shuffle. If he's not a sex offender, then his terror is completely irrational, and that may mean he's got much bigger psychological issues than the other angsty middle-aged people in this book. Colin might be an examination into mental illness, and Rowling is trying to draw the reader in by hinting that Colin's fears may be real. After all, they're real to him,
Of course, the third option is that Colin isn't a child predator or mentally ill, and he's the same Colin Wall we met in the early pages of the book. If that's the case, then Rowling is trying to fake me out. For example, Tessa was recently diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes, and she is frustrated that Colin and their son don't seem terribly concerned about it. This is because their son wants to be a sociopath when he grows up, and her husband is too wrapped up in his own minor problems to worry about her major ones. Oh, he was worried when she told him about the diagnosis, but once she explained that it wasn't a terminal condition, he dropped it completely. He is running for office, after all.
So the question is: Does this make Tessa a jerk for expecting sympathy from a guy with much bigger problems to cope with, or is Tessa a jerk for enabling Colin's bad behavior? All we know for sure is that Tessa didn't give birth to their son. The parentage of Stuart "Fats" Wall has been teased for a while now, with no reveal in sight. Did Colin impregnate one of his students? Has Tessa been covering for that indiscretion all this time?
Anyway, the group was originally meeting to discuss Colin's campaign, but the conversation has shifted to their kids getting jobs. Parminder resents that her daughter Sukhvinder is working part-time for Howard Mollison's deli. The Walls don't see a problem with that, since their son appears to have no ambition whatsoever. Parmidner's husband doesn't mind the part-time job becasue he has to admit that Sukhvinder's dyslexia is probably going to keep her from going to college, so she might as well start getting used to the workforce. Parminder doesn't buy any of this. She seems offended that one of her kids is anything less than spectacular at school, and ashamed that she would settle for waitressing when she doesn't need the money. Something tells me Parminder would be equally offended if Sukhvinder mooched off of her for the rest of her life.
I mean, there's two ways you can look at it. You can either be proud of your kid for applying herself, or you can question whether your kid is applying herself in the right direction. Parminder seems to think waitressing is beneath her family somehow, but let's face it, Sukhvinder's in high school, and her grades were bad before she took the job. Apple computers isn't going to be interviewing her anytime soon. I could see Parminder's disapproval if she wanted Sukhvinder to have some other afterschool activity. The rowing team appears to be dissolved for the time being, after all. But a job's a job, and as long as her grades don't get worse, what's the diff? But Parminder seems frustrated with the very idea of Sukhvinder as she is. It's like she expects a fairy godmother to show up and transform Sukhvinder into an MIT valedictorian, and every day that doesn't happen is all Sukhvinder's fault. It's kind of bullshit.
The matter of her working for her mom's political adversary is a little more complex, but let's be honest, there's only so many places to work in Pagford. Parminder sees it as a personal attack by Sukhvinder, or Howard, or both. And hell, maybe it is, but it's also extremely petty of Parminder to assume it off the bat like this. Seriously, Howard's enemies seem to think he's a secret racist or some sort of monster, but he did give Sukhvinder a chance when almost no one else would. Is he really the bad guy in all of this? Fangirls would probably rush to his defense, if only he had a sexier body...
VII. Back in the Price household, Andrew begins to wonder if his Ghost Message was even worth all the trouble. For maybe a week he begins to wonder if it's had any effect at all. But then his dad finally calls to withdraw from the race, due to changes in his "personal circumstances". Andrew is overjoyed to have finally defeated his father, even if no one else knows. Then Simon orders Andrew to spy on Howard Mollison when he works at the deli. He promises to put any dirt Andrew finds on the website as revenge. That's pretty dumb, considering Howard's wife runs the website. Yeah, she runs it poorly, but Simon doesn't understand that. Also, Simon's computer is in the river, so that might slow him down a little.
Andrew thinks the entire episode is over and done with, but he doesn't realize that this ghost business is "the first tiny bubble of fermenting yeast, in which was contained an inevitable, alchemical transformation." Fuck you, J.K. Rowling. This is your way of saying there's a lot more plot to go, but it rings false when it took this long for that "tiny bubble" to form in the first place. Pagford is supposed to EXPLODE INTO WAR~! any day now. Suuuurrreee it will. Stop promising and do it already.
VIII. Gaia Bawden hates living in Pagford. I don't blame her.
This section is all about Gaia, but there's really not much to be said. She's aware that Andrew Price has the hots for her, but she doesn't care, because she's used to being ogled by boys, and none of the dudes in Pagford and Yarvil compare to her boyfriend from London. She had sex with that guy like four times in a row or something, partly as a going-away ceremony, and partly to protest moving at all. She had a lot of cool friends in London and she still misses them, and the worst part is that she had to lose them all so her idiot mom could move to the boonies to pursue a spineless clod who doesn't even return her affections. None of this is much of a shock. A girl Gaia's age would probably hate her mother for one reason or another anyway, and Gavin's frustrating enough just to read about; Gaia actually has to share the bathroom with him.
Turns out, she's only befriended Sukhvinder as a silent protest of her situation. She noticed Sukhvinder was overlooked and despised by everyone at school, so she started hanging out with her for that very reason. The whole point is that Gaia finds everyone at school useless, so getting closer to Sukhvinder shows the extent of her contempt.
Gaia reveals this contempt to Sukhvinder, and Sukhvinder can't help but envy her. At least Gaia's life used to be fun. She used to have cool friends. And she's still attractive, so even if she turns up her nose at the entire school, half the students are still infatuated with her.
As they walk outside, Krystal Weedon tries to confront Sukhvinder, blaming her mom for killing her grandmother. Coincidentally, one of Sukhvinder's sisters happens along with a posse of boys, and this gives Krystal and her posse pause. I shouldn't have put the word "posse" so close to "pause". That was wrong, and I apologize. Sukhvinder now realizes that Krystal will be out to get her from now on, just like Fats. Not long after, she decides to play truant, seeing it as her only way out of danger. But before she gets very far, Tessa Wall happens by in her car.
Tessa takes her to her office, and Sukhvinder spills her guts about the abortive run-in with Krystal. Something about Tessa's body language bugs Sukhvinder, and she interprets this--rightly or wrongly--as reluctance to pursue the matter. Tessa is sympathetic to Parminder, and perhaps reluctant to deal with a hardcase like Krystal, and maybe she favors Krystal like Barry Fairbrother used to. Also, Tessa's son has been harassing her for years, so that also pisses her off.
Like the Terminator once said, anger is more useful than despair, and Sukhvinder taps into that anger. She suggests that Krystal may have heard about Parminder's role in Cath Weedon's death from Tessa's son. She also informs Tessa that Krystal and Fats have been seeing each other, to Tessa's surprise.
It's not entirely clear what Sukhvinder hopes to gain from this. Maybe nothing. She seems satisfied enough that Tessa is visibly unsettled by these revelations. Sukhvinder seems to be learning how to take out her frustrations on other people instead of cutting herself, so maybe all she wanted was to make someone else have a little taste of her own dread and inadequacy. On the other hand, if Sukhvinder is shooting for the moon, maybe she thinks she can get Fats in trouble simply for associating with Krystal, or for passing along sensitive information when he shouldn't. Or maybe Sukhvinder wants to spread the word around that her mom is under fire. We'll come back to that later.
IX. Disgusted with Miles Mollison's contempt for the Bellchapel Clinic, and also digusted with Gavin's indifference, Kay Bawden stupidly assumes that Colin Wall would be a good political ally, since he's running against Miles on the opposite platform. Kay's a social worker, you see, and she believes that the Bellchapel Clinic is one of the things keeping the Fields community going. I've never fully understood the politics of it, but it's one of the milestones of the Fields debate in the Parish Council. The pro-Fielders want to keep the Bellchapel Clinic going, the anti-Fielders want to cut funding, or cancel the lease, or bulldoze the whole thing. I don't know exactly. The point appears to be that whoever wins the argument over the rehab clinic will secure the fate of The Fields.
Apparently Kay is good-looking enough that when she shows up asking to see Colin for the first time, Tessa briefly wonders if Colin is having an affair with her. This is patently stupid, and Tessa recognizes it as such. Colin is nervous at first, but once he realizes that Kay isn't here to investigate him, he warms up to her very quickly. At last he has someone who's interested in his campaign. The Weedon family quickly comes up, and suddenly Colin is behind Krystal 100%, even though he gave her detention early in the book.
While Kay and Colin discuss strategy, Tessa ponders what Sukhvinder told her. She can't quite wrap her brain around Fats and Krystal being involved, and that bothers her. She also feels uneasy about how she convinced Krystal not to pursue a vendetta against the Jawanda kids. Krystal agreed to leave them alone, but this may have eroded the bond of trust between Tessa and Krystal. For no good reason, Tessa flashes back to when Barry founded the rowing team and convinced Krystal to join up. For various reasons, Barry could get through to Krystal, and Tessa's worried that no one else will be able to reach her the same way. But that's been the trouble all along, hasn't it? Every time a character misses Barry, it's always in a context of Barry being able to persuade others or smooth over uncomfortable situations with his good-natured personality. Barry could fix it, Barry would know what to do, if only Barry were here, etc. etc. etc. Now Barry's dead, and Krystal's actual teachers, guidance counselors, principals, and community leaders are all throwing up their hands and giving up. Even the ones that claim to support her don't seem to know how. Tessa is a professional guidance counselor. It's her damn job to "reach" Krystal, all while balancing that responsibility with the needs of the other students. She's not allowed to abdicate that responsibility and wish Barry was still here to handle it for her. He was only volunteering anyway, so whatever help he provided in life was gravy. His death ends all of that, but it never should have been taken for granted in the first place.
X. Back to Sukhvinder Jawanda. She hasn't told her siblings about her truancy, or that Krystal blames their mom for Nanna Cath's death. That said, she knows her parents will find out, because Tessa explained that she has to let them know. Tessa promised to explain why Sukhvinder tried to cut class, but Parminder is pissed about her getting a job, so you can imagine how well truancy is going to go over with her.
Parminder confronts Sukhvinder about the incident, and she's apparently been pre-pissed from some sort of family matter back in India. Something about a patch of farmland, I don't want to go into it if it's not important. Anyway, the fact that Krystal threatened Sukhvinder is completely lost on Doctor J. She's only focused on the truancy, and she's mega-defensive about the rumors surrounding her role in Cath Weedon's death. Parminder doesn't get it. She doesn't appreciate that Sukhvinder was in real danger. Instead, she seems to think Sukhvinder should have tried to defend her mother to Krystal, as if Krystal had challenged her to a debate.
This is interesting to me, because Parminder is supposed to be sticking up for people like Krystal Weedon because she's from the Fields, right? But instead she's just pissed at Krystal for impugning her qualifications as a doctor. Then you've got Tessa who likes Krystal in theory, until she starts getting involved with her son. And Colin's pro-Krystal as long as she doesn't act out in school or accuse him of any hanky-panky. The Mollisons hate Krystal because she punched one of their kids in kindergarten or something, but at least they're honest about it. And at least they give a shit when their kids are in trouble, which is more than I can say for Parminder right now.
I'm beginning to see why Sikhs aren't very happy with how they're portrayed in this book. As far as I can tell, Vikram shaves daily, so I'm not even sure he's a practicing Sikh at all. Parminder comes off like some kind of "Tiger Mother", which is really more of a Chinese stereotype, but I can't imagine Sikhs would approve of it being applied to them, either. Sukhvinder seems less than committed to the Sikh religion, and Rowling rather simplistically blames this on her learning disability: the Sikh holy texts are difficult for Sukhvinder to read, so she hasn't studied them as diligently as the rest of her family might believe. The implication here is that Western religions are way easier. I find that a little hard to swallow. Certainly, from a social standpoint, it's probably tough being a Sikh in a predominantly Christian culture, but I don't think dyslexia is a barrier to spirituality. I'd like to use Sukhvinder's siblings for reference, since they don't have learning disabilities, but we barely get to know them in the book, so I have no idea how committed they are to Sikhism. The bottom line is that this book really only has two Sikh characters of note, and one of them is miserable and the other one is so tightly wound up she could snap at any minute. It wouldn't be difficult to read into this that Sikhism Doesn't Work, and that's probably what got the Sikh community upset. Rowling probably didn't intend for that to be the message, but it would have helped if there was a more positive portrayal of Sikhism in a third character. If only Barry were here. He knew a cool Sikh from college who appreciated his kids.
Anyway, Sukhvinder goes to bed early. She wants to get out her razor and start cutting herself to deal with the pain, but she has to wait for her whole family to go to bed first, and that's gonna be a while. In the meantime, her frustration leads her to other outlets, and she goes on the Pagford website.
Okay, here's the deal. Andrew learned how to hack from a computer class in school. The technique he used was incredibly simple, and any website worth its salt would have had defenses against it. But it's still a hack. As I recall, the teacher that day probably got way off the lesson plan or something like that. The point is, Sukhvinder was in that same class, and she researched the same trick online, so she can do it too. And while Shirley Mollison had taken down the post by "The_Ghost_of_Barry_Fairbrother", she neglected to delete the account. So Sukhvinder can exploit the exact same security flaw and do the exact same thing Andrew Price did for the exact same reason. How convenient.
The only real difference here is that Sukhvinder has different dirt to reveal about her mother, and she's brazen enough to use her own computer to do the deed. She knows Parminder won't check her internet history, or even suspect Sukhvinder, because that would require Parminder to care, and that's apparently beyond her. So up goes another message from The Ghost. We don't know what it says yet, but I'm sure Rowling will explain it to us five times, as five different groups of characters discover it independently.
XI. Okay, this is the part I warned you about up at the top. Last chance to turn back. I'm taking a Marty Robbins Break before we do this...
Terri refuses to go to Catherine Weedon's funeral, probably out of shame, bitterness, anxiety, and some other words I'm probably forgetting. Krystal plans to take Robbie to the funeral, but when she realizes that Terri plans to meet up with Obbo, her pusher, she decides to stay, so she can't make sure Terri doesn't get high again.
Obbo comes over and offers Terri some heroin, but Krystal keeps telling her to send him away. Ultimately, Terri declines to accept more drugs, since she's planning to go to bed soon, and it looks like Krystal may have won the day. Thinking Obbo has left, she goes into the kitchen, only to find that Obbo has followed her instead. He rapes Krystal and leaves. The scene is as visceral as it is brief, but I'm not terribly interested in recapping it in that level of detail, so forget it.
Terri comes back to the kitchen and Krystal tells her what happened. Of course, Terri denies it, which is probably a realistic first reaction, but it also plays into her lifelong pattern of denying everything. Krystal shoves her aside in a fit of anger and leaves the house. She doesn't really know for sure where she's going, and I'm pretty sure she's just trying to get away from where she was more than anything else.
Krystal weighs her options in spite of her panic. The police are out of the question, because Terri Weedon basically. I don't know what exactly Terri has to do with not wanting to call the police, but I can believe it. Shortly after the act, she sobbed "I'll tell Mister Fairbrother," without really thinking, and she realizes that her first impulse was to go to him, even weeks after his death. He would have understood, or at least known what to do.
With disgust, Krystal considers the possibility of becoming pregnant by Obbo, and resolves to ask one of her friends about the morning-after pill at the earliest opportunity. She briefly considers Kay Bawden, but as far as she's concerned, telling a social worker would be worse than the police, since it would surely break up the family. And Nana Cath is dead, so no good there, either.
At last she has a revelation: If she were to become pregnant by Fats Wall, the Wall family might set her up in her own place, if only to quietly ensure the safety of her child. Then she could have her brother Robbie live with her and the baby, and they'd be safe from Obbo and from Terri's spiral of self-destruction. The only downside she can see is that Fats would dump her once she became pregnant, but she didn't particularly care about that. Besides, he might be different from most boys, so you never can tell. Krystal becomes convinced that having a baby will solve all her problems whether the father is in the picture or not, and with that settled, she heads for her friend Nikki's place to tend to her immediate needs.
All right, I've been trying to figure out how to interpret all of this, and this is what I've come up with.
My initial reaction was disgust and frustration. We've already seen references to Terri being sexually abused by her father during her childhood. Present-day Terri is a heroin addict on the verge of ruin. Robbie and Krystal live in squalor. Colin Wall may or may not be harassing his students. If he's not, then he may have serious mental health issues, but it's too soon to say. Sukhvinder engages in self-harm to cope with bullying. Simon Price routinely beats his wife and children. And on top of all of that, Rowling decided to add a rape scene to the book? Gee, do you think that's enough? You sure you don't want to add some necrophilia for good measure? Maybe a really graphic car accident or two?
The other thing is that all of the worst stuff happens to Krystal. Barry dies, her grandmother dies, Fats is using her for sex (even if the feeling is mutual), and now she gets raped on top of everything else. Her plan to bear children to escape her hellish life is pathetic, because she doesn't fully realize how little other people care about her. The Walls aren't going to buy her a house, I'm pretty sure of that. Hell, Colin might murder her and dump her in the river with Simon's computer just to keep her from sabotaging his campaign. I'm only half-kidding.
Look, we get it, Rowling, you can do dark. The problem is you can't do it very well. What amuses me about this book is that it stands in stark contrast to the "darker" entries in the Harry Potter series. Books 5, 6, and 7, Harry swears more and characters die off, and everyone fawns over how "dark" the series has gotten. Bullshit. I applaud Vacancy for setting a higher standard for darkness, but like everything else Rowling does, she lays it on too thick. Everyone in the book is some sort of predator, a victim, or an apathetic. The only beacons of light in this septic tank of a novel are the dead characters. I hear all about what Barry would have done and it sounds like it might have been a better story. I'd rather watch someone try to fix this world than Samantha Mollison or Tessa Wall lament it.
On the other hand...
In trying to think of a way to approach the topic of rape, I remembered the novel Red Storm Rising by Tom Clancy. My dad's a big Clancy fan, and he enjoys listening to the audiobook versions of his work. At one time, I ripped all of his RSR CD's and made a smaller set of MP3 discs, since the stereo in his truck can play those. I spent a lot of time on the project, mostly sorting the tracks so each disc would begin at the start of a chapter. This meant listening to the first few seconds of each track to make sure when the chapters began and ended. During this process, I heard the narrator very professionally utter the words "Chapter Twenty-Four. Rape."
Years later, I actually listened to the book for myself, and found out what the story was behind that infamous chapter. The main plot of RSR is that the Soviet Union instigates a Third World War, nominally for the sake of avenging a phoney terrorist attack, but in actuality the war is a pretext for conquering the Persian Gulf states to alleviate a looming oil shortage. Knowing that NATO will interfere, they employ a grand strategy to cut off supply lines between the U.S. and Europe. This relies heavily on a Soviet occupation of Iceland, and only a handful of American troops stationed in Iceland survive the invasion. So one of the subplots in the book is about three Marines and an Air Force meteorologist who are stuck on Soviet-occupied Iceland. At one point, they come upon a farmhouse hoping to obtain supplies. Turns out a band of Russian soldiers beat them to it, and their commanding officer is in the middle of raping a pregnant woman in the bedroom. The Americans take the house, killing the Russian invaders, and the Air Force officer chooses to execute the rapist on the spot, since there's no due process behind enemy lines. For the rest of the book, the four soldiers take the woman along with them as they try to avoid capture and report Soviet activity to NATO command.
Now, what impressed me about the Iceland subplot was that it was a pretty cool adventure in and of itself. Clancy could have published that portion of the novel by itself and it would have been well-received. Large parts of RSR are used to describe strategy and troop movements, rather than the boots-on-the-ground aspect of the war. Civilians are virtually invisible in the book. The Icelandic woman is one of the few non-military characters, and the only woman of any consequence. Maybe Clancy only did it to keep the plot moving, but he made her into a very strong person. Despite the trauma, despite her parents' death at the hands of the Russians, despite the conquest and occupation of her country, despite being four months' pregnant, she was still able to keep up with the marines as they marched around the countryside on foot. This was partly explained by the fact that she was a local from a rural part of the country, so she was used to that level of physical activity. The soldiers are extremely mindful of what she's been through, even though they aren't sure what to do for her, and their circumstances don't allow them time to figure it out. In the end, they respect her a great deal for being able to handle so much adversity in such a short amount of time. It's a story about the endurance of the human spirit. You want her to go to the hospital and take some time to process everything that's happened to her, but it's just not in the cards. She has to endure another ordeal, wandering around with a bunch of strange men and trying not to get shot at. When they do rest, all the pent up grief and torment starts to come back to her, and she has to deal with that as best she can. But she does endure, and she makes it to the end of the book in one piece.
I think Rowling is going for a similar thing here. Krystal Weedon is the avatar of this whole Fields issue. Some people want to write her off as a loss or foist her onto someone else's jurisdiction, but that's not an option for Krystal because she is Krystal Weedon. In her world, society is fundamentally broken. Her own mother is a liability, social workers are hamstrung by the law, and the law is decided by uncaring, self-absorbed politicians. The few people she could turn to are gradually being wiped out, and bad things continue to happen to her. In spite of all this, she continues on, weathering the storm as best she can, constantly trying to manage the situation. While other characters are giving into despair or revenge, she's still hanging on, despite far greater hardships.
If that's the case, then maybe there's something worthwhile about doing a scene like this. But that's a big "if". At the moment, it feels more like Rowling is just crossing off a bucket list of heinous crimes and social ills. I think the only thing left is child pornography.
Ugh... I think I'm just gonna call it quits for now. Hopefully the book lightens up a little from here, but I'm not counting on it.
NEXT: Episode Four, An Old Dope...
Fortunately, it's only Livejournal, so no one's even reading this anyway. But in case internet archaeologists are reading this a thousand years from now, because this is the only surviving literature from the 21st century, I just want them to know what they're in for. Also, future historians, I just want it on the record that J.K. Rowling was a terrible author.
VI. As expected, Simon Price has dumped his stolen computer just in case the police come after him. What I didn't expect was that he dumped it into a river. That might be the best way to go. I've never destroyed incriminating evidence before, so I couldn't say whether this is a good move. He certainly couldn't burn it, and anything sneakier would have probably been beyond his competency. The problem here is that it's probably too late. Everyone has seen the message on the Pagford Parish Council website accusing him of stealing computers. And for all Simon knows, someone might stumble across the remains of the computer in the water. I really hope this doesn't happen, because it would be really, really dumb, and totally up Rowling's alley.
Also, this book is set in 2012 or so, and yet this computer seems to be a desktop. I don't think the model has been specified or anything, but Rowling made a big production out of how hard it was to hook up, and when Simon told his son to un-hook everything, he made sure to remind him to get all the cables and such. I know desktops are still available, but it seems odd that Simon would go to all this trouble for kind of computer that's been declining in popularity. Then again, that low demand may have been what made it so easy to steal. And Simon's the kind of guy who steals almost for its own sake. His kids already have laptops, as I recall. But in his mind, having a "family computer" in the living room makes him more respectable, and getting a heavily discounted stolen computer makes him even more respectable, because in his mind all the important people in the world take shortcuts. To him, a guy who doesn't buy stolen goods is a sucker.
All that remains is to pull the accusation from the Pagford website. I'm just gonna call it "the website" now, because it seems to be the only one of any importance in this novel (besides Facebook), and I'm sick of trying to remember the full name of it. Just remember that this is a slapped-together geocities-style affair, primarily used as a bulletin board for small-town governance. Andrew Price was only able to hack the site because it was so badly put together, and the administrator has never had to cope with a security breach of this scale. In fairness, it's not like anyone would have expected it to come up, either.
In case anyone's just joining us: Barry Fairbrother.... is dead. That shouldn't matter to anyone, but he was important figure in his community, and the whole point of The Casual Vacancy appears to be an up-close examination of the Barry Fairbrother-shaped hole in Pagford, United Kingdom. Beyond his personal affairs, the biggest fallout of his death is that it opens up a vacancy on the Pagfrd Parish Council, and a special election is going to be held to fill his seat. Craven opportunist Simon Price sees this as a way to get sweet bribe and kickback money, but his son Andrew fears that their family will be humilitated when the public finally sees what a craven opportunist Simon is. So Andrew hacked the website, exploiting the fact that Barry's account hadn't been deactivated yet. Changing the username to "The Ghost of Barry Fairbrother," he posted an anonymous screed against his dad, hinting at all his crooked business dealings.
So far, all it's gotten Andrew is a fat lip. Simon has no idea who posted the message, but he routinely abuses his family anyway. Simon thinks it's Shirley Mollison, since Shirley is the admin for the site, and at the very least she's responsible for moderating its content. Also, Shirley volunteers at the hospital where Simon's wife, Ruth, works. And Ruth let slip that they recently got a new computer. Furthermore, Shirley's husband is the head of the Parish Council, and her son Miles is running against Simon for the vacant seat. So there's motive, means, and opportunity right there. Of course, Shirley's the one who tipped the Prices off to the message in the first place, but that could have just been her covering her tracks.
In any event, Ruth calls her and convinces her to take the Ghost Message down. Andrew observes his mom's behavior on the phone, and feels more disgust than pity. He's reached a point in his life where he can no longer view his parents in black-and-white. He's always despised his bully of a father, but he's starting to resent his mom for enabling that behavior. She apologizes for him even though he beats her, she tries to talk him out of things when it would be wiser to stay quiet, and she stays quiet when it would be wiser to speak out.
But this is all victim-blaming. Ruth could just as easily loathe Andrew for antagonizing Simon against his better judgement. Andrew fantasizes about kicking his dad's ass someday, but he's not exactly weightlifting or preparing himself for an ultimate confrontation. Instead, he smokes and sasses his father constantly, which frustrates his mom as much as she frustrates him. He doesn't understand why she doesn't just leave her father, but it's never going to be as simple as that. Ruth might just as unfairly wonder why Andrew doesn't come to her aid when Simon beats her. Ultimately, it's a lot easier for them to argue with each other, since they know it won't come to blows.
MEANWHILE, Rowling steals my schtick in order to switch to Shirley Mollison's point of view. I always wished she would do this with the Harry Potter series, but she insisted on sticking almost exclusively to Harry's P.O.V. whether it made sense or not. Now, with no single protagonist, she's got no choice, but it's inconsistent. Sometimes she sticks to one character for an entire Roman-Numeral Section, but this time she's shifting with nothing more than a new paragraph. Anyway, Shirley doesn't even know how to delete posts from the website, so she digs into her notes from that computer class she took years ago. "She did it only becase Ruth, whom she liked, had asked her to; she felt no personal responsibility in the matter."
I suppose that line is meant to demonstrate Shirley's hypocrisy at work, since, as the admin, she absolutely is responsible for what goes on the website. In other words, she's proud of herself for running the thing when it works, but when it doesn't work, that's everyone else's problem. I suppose that fits her character, except that she's extremely fixated on social status, which was why she maintains the site in the first place. To her, it's a way to demonstrate that she's even more impressive than she would be as merely the matriarch of the Mollison family. I have a hard time believing that she isn't just as mortified by this hack as Simon Price. Then again, we're not done with "The Ghost" just yet.
In any case, taking the post down doesn't change much, since others have seen it and won't easily forget. This is Rowling's excuse to shift to Parminder Jawanda, who has printed it out. Ironically, she thinks this is the work of Howard Mollison, just as he suspects "The Ghost of Barry Fairbrother" is the work of Parminder's political supporters.
She takes this up with her allies, Colin and Tessa Wall, over dinner. Tessa is probably the only one even remotely familiar with Simon Price, and she points out that "The Ghost" was likely telling the truth about what a creep he is. Parminder is determined to make this about her struggle with Mollison, and suggests that he'll target Colin next, since Colin is also running against Miles Mollison in the election.
Vikram, Parminder's husband, wonders aloud why Howard doesn't try to get on the more powerful District Council, if he's the cartoonish supervillain his wife makes him out to be. Vikram doesn't follow politics, and maybe that's why Pagford's elite respect him more than the squeaky wheel that is Parminder. She explains that Howard is too tied in to Pagford to want anything bigger, and besides, he has allies on the District Council anyway. In her mind, Aubrey Fawley works for Howard, when it's probably more like the other way around, at least the way Howard would probably see it.
What's probably stressing Parminder out is the whole dust-up about Catherine Weedon's death. I'm still fuzzy on whether Parminder actually did something wrong, but the scrutiny bothers her nonetheless. And on top of that you've got some anonymous informer spilling secrets where anyone can find them.
But Colin's on a whole other level. Everyone in this book is too engrossed in their own problems, but Colin still manages to stand out when it comes to making everything about himself. What might "The Ghost" say about him, he wonders with terror. And this is where I get a little confused.
See, Rowling does a quick flashback to establish what he's so worried about. Before he died, Barry wrote an article about the Fields, a slum that's become a political football in the local area. The newspaper plans to run the article, along with an interview with Krystal Weedon, who Barry had held up as an example of the promise of supporting the Fields community. We haven't gotten a lot out of this subplot, but it's been percolating behind the scenes all book long. Anyway, the newspaper calls up Colin Wall, because he's the principal at the school Krystal (sometimes) attends. Presumably, this was just a routine fact-checking deal, but as soon as Krystal's name comes up, Colin becomes agitated.
"Had he touched her?" is the unanswered question in his mind. He recalls his psychologist telling him not to dwell on these sorts of thoughts, and we learn Colin is taking Prozac to cope with this sort of anxiety. But the thing is, what's Colin really worried about here? Did he actually do something wrong, or is he merely afraid that voters will find out about his crippling paranoia? The problem with Colin is that he's so self-conscious that I can't be sure. All we do know is that he's now convinced that Howard Mollison is out to get him.
I don't know if Rowling is being coy or not. If she is, I have to give her credit for it. If Colin really is molesting his students--so many students that even he cannot keep track--then it's better to drag that revelation out. This book already features drug addiction, spousal abuse, child abuse, and self-harm. If Colin's a sex offender, then it could easily be lost in the shuffle. If he's not a sex offender, then his terror is completely irrational, and that may mean he's got much bigger psychological issues than the other angsty middle-aged people in this book. Colin might be an examination into mental illness, and Rowling is trying to draw the reader in by hinting that Colin's fears may be real. After all, they're real to him,
Of course, the third option is that Colin isn't a child predator or mentally ill, and he's the same Colin Wall we met in the early pages of the book. If that's the case, then Rowling is trying to fake me out. For example, Tessa was recently diagnosed with Type 2 diabetes, and she is frustrated that Colin and their son don't seem terribly concerned about it. This is because their son wants to be a sociopath when he grows up, and her husband is too wrapped up in his own minor problems to worry about her major ones. Oh, he was worried when she told him about the diagnosis, but once she explained that it wasn't a terminal condition, he dropped it completely. He is running for office, after all.
So the question is: Does this make Tessa a jerk for expecting sympathy from a guy with much bigger problems to cope with, or is Tessa a jerk for enabling Colin's bad behavior? All we know for sure is that Tessa didn't give birth to their son. The parentage of Stuart "Fats" Wall has been teased for a while now, with no reveal in sight. Did Colin impregnate one of his students? Has Tessa been covering for that indiscretion all this time?
Anyway, the group was originally meeting to discuss Colin's campaign, but the conversation has shifted to their kids getting jobs. Parminder resents that her daughter Sukhvinder is working part-time for Howard Mollison's deli. The Walls don't see a problem with that, since their son appears to have no ambition whatsoever. Parmidner's husband doesn't mind the part-time job becasue he has to admit that Sukhvinder's dyslexia is probably going to keep her from going to college, so she might as well start getting used to the workforce. Parminder doesn't buy any of this. She seems offended that one of her kids is anything less than spectacular at school, and ashamed that she would settle for waitressing when she doesn't need the money. Something tells me Parminder would be equally offended if Sukhvinder mooched off of her for the rest of her life.
I mean, there's two ways you can look at it. You can either be proud of your kid for applying herself, or you can question whether your kid is applying herself in the right direction. Parminder seems to think waitressing is beneath her family somehow, but let's face it, Sukhvinder's in high school, and her grades were bad before she took the job. Apple computers isn't going to be interviewing her anytime soon. I could see Parminder's disapproval if she wanted Sukhvinder to have some other afterschool activity. The rowing team appears to be dissolved for the time being, after all. But a job's a job, and as long as her grades don't get worse, what's the diff? But Parminder seems frustrated with the very idea of Sukhvinder as she is. It's like she expects a fairy godmother to show up and transform Sukhvinder into an MIT valedictorian, and every day that doesn't happen is all Sukhvinder's fault. It's kind of bullshit.
The matter of her working for her mom's political adversary is a little more complex, but let's be honest, there's only so many places to work in Pagford. Parminder sees it as a personal attack by Sukhvinder, or Howard, or both. And hell, maybe it is, but it's also extremely petty of Parminder to assume it off the bat like this. Seriously, Howard's enemies seem to think he's a secret racist or some sort of monster, but he did give Sukhvinder a chance when almost no one else would. Is he really the bad guy in all of this? Fangirls would probably rush to his defense, if only he had a sexier body...
VII. Back in the Price household, Andrew begins to wonder if his Ghost Message was even worth all the trouble. For maybe a week he begins to wonder if it's had any effect at all. But then his dad finally calls to withdraw from the race, due to changes in his "personal circumstances". Andrew is overjoyed to have finally defeated his father, even if no one else knows. Then Simon orders Andrew to spy on Howard Mollison when he works at the deli. He promises to put any dirt Andrew finds on the website as revenge. That's pretty dumb, considering Howard's wife runs the website. Yeah, she runs it poorly, but Simon doesn't understand that. Also, Simon's computer is in the river, so that might slow him down a little.
Andrew thinks the entire episode is over and done with, but he doesn't realize that this ghost business is "the first tiny bubble of fermenting yeast, in which was contained an inevitable, alchemical transformation." Fuck you, J.K. Rowling. This is your way of saying there's a lot more plot to go, but it rings false when it took this long for that "tiny bubble" to form in the first place. Pagford is supposed to EXPLODE INTO WAR~! any day now. Suuuurrreee it will. Stop promising and do it already.
VIII. Gaia Bawden hates living in Pagford. I don't blame her.
This section is all about Gaia, but there's really not much to be said. She's aware that Andrew Price has the hots for her, but she doesn't care, because she's used to being ogled by boys, and none of the dudes in Pagford and Yarvil compare to her boyfriend from London. She had sex with that guy like four times in a row or something, partly as a going-away ceremony, and partly to protest moving at all. She had a lot of cool friends in London and she still misses them, and the worst part is that she had to lose them all so her idiot mom could move to the boonies to pursue a spineless clod who doesn't even return her affections. None of this is much of a shock. A girl Gaia's age would probably hate her mother for one reason or another anyway, and Gavin's frustrating enough just to read about; Gaia actually has to share the bathroom with him.
Turns out, she's only befriended Sukhvinder as a silent protest of her situation. She noticed Sukhvinder was overlooked and despised by everyone at school, so she started hanging out with her for that very reason. The whole point is that Gaia finds everyone at school useless, so getting closer to Sukhvinder shows the extent of her contempt.
Gaia reveals this contempt to Sukhvinder, and Sukhvinder can't help but envy her. At least Gaia's life used to be fun. She used to have cool friends. And she's still attractive, so even if she turns up her nose at the entire school, half the students are still infatuated with her.
As they walk outside, Krystal Weedon tries to confront Sukhvinder, blaming her mom for killing her grandmother. Coincidentally, one of Sukhvinder's sisters happens along with a posse of boys, and this gives Krystal and her posse pause. I shouldn't have put the word "posse" so close to "pause". That was wrong, and I apologize. Sukhvinder now realizes that Krystal will be out to get her from now on, just like Fats. Not long after, she decides to play truant, seeing it as her only way out of danger. But before she gets very far, Tessa Wall happens by in her car.
Tessa takes her to her office, and Sukhvinder spills her guts about the abortive run-in with Krystal. Something about Tessa's body language bugs Sukhvinder, and she interprets this--rightly or wrongly--as reluctance to pursue the matter. Tessa is sympathetic to Parminder, and perhaps reluctant to deal with a hardcase like Krystal, and maybe she favors Krystal like Barry Fairbrother used to. Also, Tessa's son has been harassing her for years, so that also pisses her off.
Like the Terminator once said, anger is more useful than despair, and Sukhvinder taps into that anger. She suggests that Krystal may have heard about Parminder's role in Cath Weedon's death from Tessa's son. She also informs Tessa that Krystal and Fats have been seeing each other, to Tessa's surprise.
It's not entirely clear what Sukhvinder hopes to gain from this. Maybe nothing. She seems satisfied enough that Tessa is visibly unsettled by these revelations. Sukhvinder seems to be learning how to take out her frustrations on other people instead of cutting herself, so maybe all she wanted was to make someone else have a little taste of her own dread and inadequacy. On the other hand, if Sukhvinder is shooting for the moon, maybe she thinks she can get Fats in trouble simply for associating with Krystal, or for passing along sensitive information when he shouldn't. Or maybe Sukhvinder wants to spread the word around that her mom is under fire. We'll come back to that later.
IX. Disgusted with Miles Mollison's contempt for the Bellchapel Clinic, and also digusted with Gavin's indifference, Kay Bawden stupidly assumes that Colin Wall would be a good political ally, since he's running against Miles on the opposite platform. Kay's a social worker, you see, and she believes that the Bellchapel Clinic is one of the things keeping the Fields community going. I've never fully understood the politics of it, but it's one of the milestones of the Fields debate in the Parish Council. The pro-Fielders want to keep the Bellchapel Clinic going, the anti-Fielders want to cut funding, or cancel the lease, or bulldoze the whole thing. I don't know exactly. The point appears to be that whoever wins the argument over the rehab clinic will secure the fate of The Fields.
Apparently Kay is good-looking enough that when she shows up asking to see Colin for the first time, Tessa briefly wonders if Colin is having an affair with her. This is patently stupid, and Tessa recognizes it as such. Colin is nervous at first, but once he realizes that Kay isn't here to investigate him, he warms up to her very quickly. At last he has someone who's interested in his campaign. The Weedon family quickly comes up, and suddenly Colin is behind Krystal 100%, even though he gave her detention early in the book.
While Kay and Colin discuss strategy, Tessa ponders what Sukhvinder told her. She can't quite wrap her brain around Fats and Krystal being involved, and that bothers her. She also feels uneasy about how she convinced Krystal not to pursue a vendetta against the Jawanda kids. Krystal agreed to leave them alone, but this may have eroded the bond of trust between Tessa and Krystal. For no good reason, Tessa flashes back to when Barry founded the rowing team and convinced Krystal to join up. For various reasons, Barry could get through to Krystal, and Tessa's worried that no one else will be able to reach her the same way. But that's been the trouble all along, hasn't it? Every time a character misses Barry, it's always in a context of Barry being able to persuade others or smooth over uncomfortable situations with his good-natured personality. Barry could fix it, Barry would know what to do, if only Barry were here, etc. etc. etc. Now Barry's dead, and Krystal's actual teachers, guidance counselors, principals, and community leaders are all throwing up their hands and giving up. Even the ones that claim to support her don't seem to know how. Tessa is a professional guidance counselor. It's her damn job to "reach" Krystal, all while balancing that responsibility with the needs of the other students. She's not allowed to abdicate that responsibility and wish Barry was still here to handle it for her. He was only volunteering anyway, so whatever help he provided in life was gravy. His death ends all of that, but it never should have been taken for granted in the first place.
X. Back to Sukhvinder Jawanda. She hasn't told her siblings about her truancy, or that Krystal blames their mom for Nanna Cath's death. That said, she knows her parents will find out, because Tessa explained that she has to let them know. Tessa promised to explain why Sukhvinder tried to cut class, but Parminder is pissed about her getting a job, so you can imagine how well truancy is going to go over with her.
Parminder confronts Sukhvinder about the incident, and she's apparently been pre-pissed from some sort of family matter back in India. Something about a patch of farmland, I don't want to go into it if it's not important. Anyway, the fact that Krystal threatened Sukhvinder is completely lost on Doctor J. She's only focused on the truancy, and she's mega-defensive about the rumors surrounding her role in Cath Weedon's death. Parminder doesn't get it. She doesn't appreciate that Sukhvinder was in real danger. Instead, she seems to think Sukhvinder should have tried to defend her mother to Krystal, as if Krystal had challenged her to a debate.
This is interesting to me, because Parminder is supposed to be sticking up for people like Krystal Weedon because she's from the Fields, right? But instead she's just pissed at Krystal for impugning her qualifications as a doctor. Then you've got Tessa who likes Krystal in theory, until she starts getting involved with her son. And Colin's pro-Krystal as long as she doesn't act out in school or accuse him of any hanky-panky. The Mollisons hate Krystal because she punched one of their kids in kindergarten or something, but at least they're honest about it. And at least they give a shit when their kids are in trouble, which is more than I can say for Parminder right now.
I'm beginning to see why Sikhs aren't very happy with how they're portrayed in this book. As far as I can tell, Vikram shaves daily, so I'm not even sure he's a practicing Sikh at all. Parminder comes off like some kind of "Tiger Mother", which is really more of a Chinese stereotype, but I can't imagine Sikhs would approve of it being applied to them, either. Sukhvinder seems less than committed to the Sikh religion, and Rowling rather simplistically blames this on her learning disability: the Sikh holy texts are difficult for Sukhvinder to read, so she hasn't studied them as diligently as the rest of her family might believe. The implication here is that Western religions are way easier. I find that a little hard to swallow. Certainly, from a social standpoint, it's probably tough being a Sikh in a predominantly Christian culture, but I don't think dyslexia is a barrier to spirituality. I'd like to use Sukhvinder's siblings for reference, since they don't have learning disabilities, but we barely get to know them in the book, so I have no idea how committed they are to Sikhism. The bottom line is that this book really only has two Sikh characters of note, and one of them is miserable and the other one is so tightly wound up she could snap at any minute. It wouldn't be difficult to read into this that Sikhism Doesn't Work, and that's probably what got the Sikh community upset. Rowling probably didn't intend for that to be the message, but it would have helped if there was a more positive portrayal of Sikhism in a third character. If only Barry were here. He knew a cool Sikh from college who appreciated his kids.
Anyway, Sukhvinder goes to bed early. She wants to get out her razor and start cutting herself to deal with the pain, but she has to wait for her whole family to go to bed first, and that's gonna be a while. In the meantime, her frustration leads her to other outlets, and she goes on the Pagford website.
Okay, here's the deal. Andrew learned how to hack from a computer class in school. The technique he used was incredibly simple, and any website worth its salt would have had defenses against it. But it's still a hack. As I recall, the teacher that day probably got way off the lesson plan or something like that. The point is, Sukhvinder was in that same class, and she researched the same trick online, so she can do it too. And while Shirley Mollison had taken down the post by "The_Ghost_of_Barry_Fairbrother", she neglected to delete the account. So Sukhvinder can exploit the exact same security flaw and do the exact same thing Andrew Price did for the exact same reason. How convenient.
The only real difference here is that Sukhvinder has different dirt to reveal about her mother, and she's brazen enough to use her own computer to do the deed. She knows Parminder won't check her internet history, or even suspect Sukhvinder, because that would require Parminder to care, and that's apparently beyond her. So up goes another message from The Ghost. We don't know what it says yet, but I'm sure Rowling will explain it to us five times, as five different groups of characters discover it independently.
XI. Okay, this is the part I warned you about up at the top. Last chance to turn back. I'm taking a Marty Robbins Break before we do this...
Click to viewTerri refuses to go to Catherine Weedon's funeral, probably out of shame, bitterness, anxiety, and some other words I'm probably forgetting. Krystal plans to take Robbie to the funeral, but when she realizes that Terri plans to meet up with Obbo, her pusher, she decides to stay, so she can't make sure Terri doesn't get high again.
Obbo comes over and offers Terri some heroin, but Krystal keeps telling her to send him away. Ultimately, Terri declines to accept more drugs, since she's planning to go to bed soon, and it looks like Krystal may have won the day. Thinking Obbo has left, she goes into the kitchen, only to find that Obbo has followed her instead. He rapes Krystal and leaves. The scene is as visceral as it is brief, but I'm not terribly interested in recapping it in that level of detail, so forget it.
Terri comes back to the kitchen and Krystal tells her what happened. Of course, Terri denies it, which is probably a realistic first reaction, but it also plays into her lifelong pattern of denying everything. Krystal shoves her aside in a fit of anger and leaves the house. She doesn't really know for sure where she's going, and I'm pretty sure she's just trying to get away from where she was more than anything else.
Krystal weighs her options in spite of her panic. The police are out of the question, because Terri Weedon basically. I don't know what exactly Terri has to do with not wanting to call the police, but I can believe it. Shortly after the act, she sobbed "I'll tell Mister Fairbrother," without really thinking, and she realizes that her first impulse was to go to him, even weeks after his death. He would have understood, or at least known what to do.
With disgust, Krystal considers the possibility of becoming pregnant by Obbo, and resolves to ask one of her friends about the morning-after pill at the earliest opportunity. She briefly considers Kay Bawden, but as far as she's concerned, telling a social worker would be worse than the police, since it would surely break up the family. And Nana Cath is dead, so no good there, either.
At last she has a revelation: If she were to become pregnant by Fats Wall, the Wall family might set her up in her own place, if only to quietly ensure the safety of her child. Then she could have her brother Robbie live with her and the baby, and they'd be safe from Obbo and from Terri's spiral of self-destruction. The only downside she can see is that Fats would dump her once she became pregnant, but she didn't particularly care about that. Besides, he might be different from most boys, so you never can tell. Krystal becomes convinced that having a baby will solve all her problems whether the father is in the picture or not, and with that settled, she heads for her friend Nikki's place to tend to her immediate needs.
All right, I've been trying to figure out how to interpret all of this, and this is what I've come up with.
My initial reaction was disgust and frustration. We've already seen references to Terri being sexually abused by her father during her childhood. Present-day Terri is a heroin addict on the verge of ruin. Robbie and Krystal live in squalor. Colin Wall may or may not be harassing his students. If he's not, then he may have serious mental health issues, but it's too soon to say. Sukhvinder engages in self-harm to cope with bullying. Simon Price routinely beats his wife and children. And on top of all of that, Rowling decided to add a rape scene to the book? Gee, do you think that's enough? You sure you don't want to add some necrophilia for good measure? Maybe a really graphic car accident or two?
The other thing is that all of the worst stuff happens to Krystal. Barry dies, her grandmother dies, Fats is using her for sex (even if the feeling is mutual), and now she gets raped on top of everything else. Her plan to bear children to escape her hellish life is pathetic, because she doesn't fully realize how little other people care about her. The Walls aren't going to buy her a house, I'm pretty sure of that. Hell, Colin might murder her and dump her in the river with Simon's computer just to keep her from sabotaging his campaign. I'm only half-kidding.
Look, we get it, Rowling, you can do dark. The problem is you can't do it very well. What amuses me about this book is that it stands in stark contrast to the "darker" entries in the Harry Potter series. Books 5, 6, and 7, Harry swears more and characters die off, and everyone fawns over how "dark" the series has gotten. Bullshit. I applaud Vacancy for setting a higher standard for darkness, but like everything else Rowling does, she lays it on too thick. Everyone in the book is some sort of predator, a victim, or an apathetic. The only beacons of light in this septic tank of a novel are the dead characters. I hear all about what Barry would have done and it sounds like it might have been a better story. I'd rather watch someone try to fix this world than Samantha Mollison or Tessa Wall lament it.
On the other hand...
In trying to think of a way to approach the topic of rape, I remembered the novel Red Storm Rising by Tom Clancy. My dad's a big Clancy fan, and he enjoys listening to the audiobook versions of his work. At one time, I ripped all of his RSR CD's and made a smaller set of MP3 discs, since the stereo in his truck can play those. I spent a lot of time on the project, mostly sorting the tracks so each disc would begin at the start of a chapter. This meant listening to the first few seconds of each track to make sure when the chapters began and ended. During this process, I heard the narrator very professionally utter the words "Chapter Twenty-Four. Rape."
Years later, I actually listened to the book for myself, and found out what the story was behind that infamous chapter. The main plot of RSR is that the Soviet Union instigates a Third World War, nominally for the sake of avenging a phoney terrorist attack, but in actuality the war is a pretext for conquering the Persian Gulf states to alleviate a looming oil shortage. Knowing that NATO will interfere, they employ a grand strategy to cut off supply lines between the U.S. and Europe. This relies heavily on a Soviet occupation of Iceland, and only a handful of American troops stationed in Iceland survive the invasion. So one of the subplots in the book is about three Marines and an Air Force meteorologist who are stuck on Soviet-occupied Iceland. At one point, they come upon a farmhouse hoping to obtain supplies. Turns out a band of Russian soldiers beat them to it, and their commanding officer is in the middle of raping a pregnant woman in the bedroom. The Americans take the house, killing the Russian invaders, and the Air Force officer chooses to execute the rapist on the spot, since there's no due process behind enemy lines. For the rest of the book, the four soldiers take the woman along with them as they try to avoid capture and report Soviet activity to NATO command.
Now, what impressed me about the Iceland subplot was that it was a pretty cool adventure in and of itself. Clancy could have published that portion of the novel by itself and it would have been well-received. Large parts of RSR are used to describe strategy and troop movements, rather than the boots-on-the-ground aspect of the war. Civilians are virtually invisible in the book. The Icelandic woman is one of the few non-military characters, and the only woman of any consequence. Maybe Clancy only did it to keep the plot moving, but he made her into a very strong person. Despite the trauma, despite her parents' death at the hands of the Russians, despite the conquest and occupation of her country, despite being four months' pregnant, she was still able to keep up with the marines as they marched around the countryside on foot. This was partly explained by the fact that she was a local from a rural part of the country, so she was used to that level of physical activity. The soldiers are extremely mindful of what she's been through, even though they aren't sure what to do for her, and their circumstances don't allow them time to figure it out. In the end, they respect her a great deal for being able to handle so much adversity in such a short amount of time. It's a story about the endurance of the human spirit. You want her to go to the hospital and take some time to process everything that's happened to her, but it's just not in the cards. She has to endure another ordeal, wandering around with a bunch of strange men and trying not to get shot at. When they do rest, all the pent up grief and torment starts to come back to her, and she has to deal with that as best she can. But she does endure, and she makes it to the end of the book in one piece.
I think Rowling is going for a similar thing here. Krystal Weedon is the avatar of this whole Fields issue. Some people want to write her off as a loss or foist her onto someone else's jurisdiction, but that's not an option for Krystal because she is Krystal Weedon. In her world, society is fundamentally broken. Her own mother is a liability, social workers are hamstrung by the law, and the law is decided by uncaring, self-absorbed politicians. The few people she could turn to are gradually being wiped out, and bad things continue to happen to her. In spite of all this, she continues on, weathering the storm as best she can, constantly trying to manage the situation. While other characters are giving into despair or revenge, she's still hanging on, despite far greater hardships.
If that's the case, then maybe there's something worthwhile about doing a scene like this. But that's a big "if". At the moment, it feels more like Rowling is just crossing off a bucket list of heinous crimes and social ills. I think the only thing left is child pornography.
Ugh... I think I'm just gonna call it quits for now. Hopefully the book lightens up a little from here, but I'm not counting on it.
NEXT: Episode Four, An Old Dope...