Willy

by
Robert Dunbar

Uninvited Books, January 2011, 257 pp.
ISBN: 978-0-9830427-2-4

Genre: Horror
Subgenre: Literary Dark Fiction
Reviewed: 6/13/2011

Reviewed by: Mark McKenna

Book Cover

Excerpt

Walking near the field today, shouting started.

That kid who wanted my homework and some other guys kept punching the fat kid. There was a whole tangle of them and a bunch of punches that kept missing, but not enough. One of the guys jumped up like this was a game or something and came down swinging his fists like a hammer. Mostly they just got in each other's ways, but the fat kid had blood coming out of his nose. I hate to see stuff like that. He fell and got kicked hard. Then the Gym teacher showed up and made them stop, but with this "can't help it, guys" expression on his face, like the kid deserved it for being fat. Then he had trouble standing up, and I felt worse when he wobbled a little and the guys laughed. The teacher took him away to take care of him but made a face doing it, and the fat kid knew it.

One of the kids who did the punching is the one with the short hair like he thinks he's in the army of something. His skull shows all the way around. A couple of times he's said something to me, and I think his name is Joe, too. Weird. Maybe everybody here is named Joe. It’s lunch now. He just came up to my table and told me not to study so hard. "Long as you don't hang yourself of stab nobody they pass you." I thought about making some kind of a crack about what if you stab yourself or hang somebody, but he was talking to some other kid by then so I just kept writing. He probably thinks I'm strange.

Synopsis

Willy, a novel by Robert Dunbar, is told entirely through the journal entries of a nameless boy with severe emotional problems. The teen is dropped off in the middle of the night at his new school which specializes in treating boys with psychological disorders. The school is a complex of decaying, Gothic structures surrounded by dark woods. It's winter. The school's founder, Dean Forester, is an old man who is dying. The school principal (and principle antagonist) is a Dr. Spenser. The faculty is a motley crew; some good teachers, some bad. A prefect named Bigelow keeps an eye on the boys at night.

The narrator eventually meets his roommate "Willy," a charismatic, wise-beyond-his-years boy with Hannibal Lector-like powers of control over the other boys, as well as over the staff. Through Willy’s appreciation and teaching, the wounded narrator begins to heal and emerge from his shell.

Willy shares his powers with his new roommate -- or transfers them. The two boys share intimate moments, including physical ones. As the novel progresses, the journal-writing narrator begins to take on Willy's personality, becoming a figure of power in his own right. He also takes on Willy's mission, which is to oppose Dr. Spenser; the sexual abuse of boys by Spenser is hinted at in the book.

When the climax occurs the journal-writing narrator is swept up in Willy's life and mission. But is it really Willy's mission -- or some unnamed horror residing in the school itself?

Willy is a horror book written by Robert Dunbar.

Review

There is a very skillful writer at work in Willy. Robert Dunbar has created a believable teen, with believable issues who, as the book progresses, comes out of his withdrawn state and starts to rejoin the world and heal. The vagueness of outer plot detail is complemented by Dunbar's precision in relating inner details of his character's emotional journey.

The nameless narrator begins the book almost completely introverted and all outer action is reported through his eyes. In addition to being an "unreliable narrator," he’s made even more unreliable by mental illness. So the strength of Willy -- its atmospheric, hermetic point of view -- is also a weakness. We catch only glimpses of the outer world so the effect of the "horror" is diminished by its vagueness. It's hard to know what's going on out there.

Outer world events are inferred by snatches of conversation, hinted at by index cards hidden in a speech, presaged by the looming figure of a statue in a courtyard and, in the end, proved by a rising body count that seems almost gratuitously tacked on. The novel's artistic and atmospheric rendering prevented it from being as gripping as it might have been.

Having said that, Robert Dunbar’s writing skills make Willy a book worth reading. The portrayal of students and faculty and the accounts of the boys' bonding adventures are all fresh, credible and creatively told. The teen's journal-writing insights are sometimes profound, but always honest and  authentic. It's nice how the boy's perceptions grow keener as he emerges. Dunbar does cool things with typography, using strikethroughs to show his character's indecision, or confusion. Mysteriously, other entries appear in the teen's journal, heightening suspense and challenging the book's own structure, yet they work.

In Willy, Robert Dunbar has written a book similar to Our Tragic Universe by Scarlett Thomas, a book that eschews a Hollywood (or any) traditional ending. Willy is a journey of healing, with darkness and horror both as a backdrop and a catalyst. Although Willy brightens in the end, the book remains as mysterious as mental illness itself.

I rated this book a 7½ out of 10.