There are dysfunctional families, and then there are the Beckers.
Eleanor Becker and her family provide the beating hearts at the center of LITTLE SHIPS, A Novel—by both blood and marriage. It’s a delicately built, Rashomon-esque novel of perspectives and misunderstandings. At a simple level, it tells a coming-of-age story about a woman in her 60s. But that story is woven into a complex quilt of family dynamics steadily revealed as tender, understandable, repressed—and ultimately horrifying.
Author Sandra Scofield is a tough taskmaster with her words, allowing their use in only the most economic fashion. And yet they lay out wrenching tales in plain, unembellished language. After one taciturn character loses somebody dear to her, she is driven to the morgue: “She sat most of the way with her eyes closed. Every once in a while, she gasped.”
LITTLE SHIPS falls into five parts: “March,” “April,” “May,” and “June” follow “Bloom,” which describes in only 10 opening pages the delightful and curious courtship of Nick and Karin. Subsequent sections introduce their daughters Tilde and Juni, along with their parents: Eleanor and Walter (Nick’s), and Helve and Henry (Karin’s).
Many more follow, sometimes at an overwhelming rate; and, with each new layer, the focus of the novel seems to shift. Is it about Nick and Karin? Eleanor and Walter? Helve and Henry? Or Tilde and her apparently troubled sibling Juni? The upbringing of the pre-teen girls is certainly unorthodox, with its arbitrary homeschooling, moody matriarch, and parental absences.
The reader might find these character and narrative shifts distracting, but ultimately that ostensible flaw helps to paint the disorienting, sometimes contradictory stories of these well-intended but deeply damaged lives. The reader is taken in at each turn, just as Eleanor is, who eventually solidifies into the book’s protagonist: an imperfect, difficult woman, but one who changes and grows by the story’s end.
Along with economy of words, Scofield is adept at using objects that shift in meaning. Both girls are drawn to math. For Tilde, math is a passion and a portal to social integration: a club with like-minded others. But for Juni, it is a lifeline because it is unambiguous, promising success if she tackles its problems one step at a time.
One passage feels forced, less integrated into the book’s action: a summary of Eleanor’s difficult childhood, dispatched in a single, past-tense section that alludes to such interesting narrative possibilities that it threatens to overshadow the novel’s central story. Unlike with other passages, this one’s contribution to the overall narrative is slight. But this is a minor quibble.
Of particular fascination is the relationship between the mothers-in-law, as they tussle for dominance but discover secrets and unaddressed heartaches within one other. These kinds of discoveries also flip the reader right along with the characters. Like the vessels of the novel’s title, we journey through prismatic ocean waters that are constantly changing in color and depth—at times supportive, at other times threatening to drown. Throughout its storms and challenges, LITTLE SHIPS is a voyage well worth taking.
In LITTLE SHIPS, A Novel, author Sandra Scofield’s unembellished words and quixotic characters build a heart-breaking, beautifully crafted story of a deeply flawed extended family.
~Anne Welsbacher for IndieReader