Dance on My Grave (Reprint) [Import] [Paperback]

Aidan Chambers (Author)

Product Details

• Paperback: 256 pages
• Publisher: Bodley Head Children's Books (May 1982)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0370303660
• ISBN-13: 978-0370303666
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5 x 0.8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (1 customer review)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4.0 out of 5 stars Adult love and grief, September 8, 2008

By 

Raymond Mathiesen (Armidale, N.S.W., Australia) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: dance on My Grave (Mass Market Paperback)

Hal Robinson is sixteen, has just finished his school exams and has no idea what he wants to do with his life. Will he stay on at school? If so what will he study? Or will he get a job like his father wants? Hal lives at Southend, the part of London where the Thames River meets the sea. One day he 'borrows' a friend's sail-boat without asking permission. A storm blows up and soon Hal capsizes the boat. Then into his life sails Barry Gorman, eighteen year old, expert sailor, who rescues Hal and who it seems will soon sort Hal's life out. Soon Hal finds himself falling deeply in love with Barry, and it seems his every fantasy is about to be fulfilled. But, as Hal reveals at the very beginning of the book, Barry's life is destined to be cut short.

This book is written in a quirky, interesting, experimental manner. The text consists of Hal's first person account, six "running reports" by Hal's social worker, two newspaper clippings, and a school essay. The personal account features "action replays" in which Hal goes over the scene he has just described filling in the psychological details that could not be included in the flow of action. One important theme to arise is the 'postmodern' question of how much a written account mirrors reality? Hal desperately wants to be honest, but no matter how much he tries his words fail to describe the true 'feeling' of events, or can be interpreted in a way that varies from the 'truth'.

While being an account of a death the book is often surprisingly funny. I found myself laughing out loud in several parts. Grief, however, inevitably takes the main stage at the end of the story, and is represented in some considerable depth. This is not really a tear-jerker though, as throughout the book we have always known that Barry will die.

Of course the book is also a description of first adult love, in all its depth and pain. As the story progresses Hal moves from confused teenager to wounded but wiser adult. While this could be described as a 'gay' story the book can be also enjoyed by 'straight' adolescent readers: love, death and truth are in fact universal themes no matter in what details we dress them. The story includes some sex but it is only very discretely referred to.

This is an English novel and some colloquialisms and cultural references are included which US audiences may find difficult to understand. There is not enough of this though to make the book inaccessible: in fact most of the text should be crystal clear.