| Book Reviews |
Foreword Magazine Lost Souls Fiction Written by Dan Krajewski Published by iUniverse Inc Copyright © 2007 Daniel Joseph Krajewski ISBN 0-595-42012-5 $12.95 141 pages ACCIDENTAL? “Hell is other people.” -No Exit, Jean Paul Sartre Samuel Beckett, well know playwright (“Waiting for Godot, End Game) was also a novelist (Murphy, Watt). In Beckett’s post-modern experimental short novel Comment C’est (How It Is) His protagonist crawls through and endless expanse of mud while dragging a sack of food behind him. He soon catches up with a person crawling ahead of and attempts to torture him into speech. Soon the protagonist is left behind and is over come by the crawler behind him, a cyclic romp through purgatory. Beckett’s protagonist says, “My mistakes are my life.” In Daniel Krajewski’s novel Lost Souls, before the prologue Krajewski quotes from the alternative music band Radiohead’s song, There There(The Boney King Of Nowhere), “We are accidents waiting to happen.” Both Beckett’s and Radiohead’s quotes are common themes that run throughout the entirety of Krajewski’s short but meaty novel, from the very first sentence, “That pathetic coward.” to the last gasp of two words on the final page, “Truly lost.” Like Radiohead’s lyrics and Beckett’s protagonist there is a feeling of being buffeted by helplessness and a sense of hapless and hopeless futile driven predestination. Lost Souls is written in the first person perspective of four main characters: (except the prologue, which is the first person perspective of the character Ally and the epilogue written in the first person perspective of the character Braska.) Ander, Catherine, Clive, and Razer. In a multi-first person driven narrative, novice writers tend to give each character the same ‘voice’. It becomes difficult for the reader to distinguish the different characters and causes tedious redundancies and diminished reader interest in the plot. Krajewski’s masterful writing creates a distinct and clear voice for each of his characters and enhances the reader relationship. One becomes caught up in the skillfully constructed vignettes of each character that read like a white hot rocket across the page. Lost Souls is about what exactly the title implies, being lost, not metaphorically, but actually being lost in reality or maybe never fitting in reality to begin with; at least not what we of the normal world discern as reality. Krajewski’s populates his novel with lost souls like: Ander, a young man on the verge of manhood walks through life like haunted house that takes his ghosts and wraiths with him. His tenuous hold on reality is Lindsey, his girlfriend and victim to his Lovecraftian visions. Krajewski writes, “I catch a lightning-quick snap shot of something else shining behind her face. It was like a picture negative, or an x-ray. For an instant her mouth was open hideously wide, like and angler fish, or a cobra. She was all teeth…Tears slide down my eyes and drip onto Lindsey’s breasts…A thousand sorrows claim my heart. I hear it break, an audible muted thump. There is no love or beauty in the world. There is only misery and pathos…” Clive is a telepath and petty crook with extraordinary powers. He is constantly bombarded by the thoughts of others, especially their deepest darkest sinful thoughts. He tells fortunes to scrape together the measly cash to sustain him-self on the road. His mind is so scattered and disjointed that he needs to focus on a book of art work to quiet the turmoil. Krajewski writes, “I think part of the reason I’m insane is because I never dream. I sleep and it’s like dying temporarily. There’s just a big void underneath my eyelids. Maybe it’s all these fuckers’ thoughts. They cannibalized all mine, and when I sleep there’s nothing left. Nothing. The abyss. Home.” Razer is the oldest ‘lost soul’ in the youngest looking shell. She is a 150 year old vampire in the permanent guise of a six year old girl. She easily manipulates those around her, takes enough blood to survive and covers her tracks. Razer is similar to the character Claudia in Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles, specifically the novels, An Interview With A Vampire and The Vampire, Lestat. Although both are portrayed arrogant and intelligent, where Claudia seems evil and resentful, Razer is more interested in her everyday survival and is more accepting to who and what she is. Krajewski writes, “This one crept up on me much faster. I returned to the hotel room at an hour before sunrise (knowing I had an hour because my skin began to crawl slightly)…Being who I am, it’s all in the blood. I can smell it so acutely on humans I can practically taste it, and I can tell everything about them from it. It’s as unique as a fingerprint or snowflake. I know by the scent whether it’s male or female, whether it’s young or old, even ethnicity is no secret to blood…It’s actually the emotional experiences and sins that taint the taste of blood. Stale, rank blood indicates a person devoid of virtue and piety. The sweetest blood always belongs to the innocent, the unspoiled. Blood does not ripen. It rots.” Catherine has no special powers, but she is the keystone to Lost Souls. Her sadness is so extreme that she gave up everything, job, lover and hope. Hers’ is a life of mourning and emptiness to the point where she has slipped off coils of normalcy and has seeped beneath an underbelly of despair to the in-between-places where reality is thin and the true world is shown. Krajewski writes, “I can’t believe the sun rose this morning. I don’t understand how those people outside are walking around shopping and going to work. They should be home, crying like I am. Those kids shouldn’t be playing with water guns. They should be worrying about the future. Someone should tell them how miserable the world is. Someone should tell them how deep their unhappiness can run and what a lie everything they’ve been told is. They should be dead, and their parents should be crying at home.” If Dean Koontz wrote Lost Souls, Razer, Catherine, Clive and Ander would gather together (usually with a dog) and have a fighting chance as we the readers see the author’s almost invisible hands like an omniscient god prod his creations in staged hackneyed play. Dan Krajewski’s virtuoso writing makes one forget one is reading a book. The pace is so fast and people are so diversified that the reader takes a bastardized road trip to the ultimate head on collision. After all, “We are accidents waiting to happen and our mistakes are our lives.” -Lee Gooden 2-23-07 |