Bookends – Nov 18, 2016

PAGE ONE:

>>>BOOK NEWS

SpaceX’s Elon Musk turns to science fiction for Mars ship [pic: hitchhiker’s guide]

If SpaceX founder Elon Musk’s plan to establish a city on Mars sounds like science fiction, then consider the name of his first passenger ship.

The answer lies in

The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the comic series about the travels and travails of Earth’s last surviving man.

Musk is leaning toward the name

Heart of Gold, the starship in the novel with Infinite Improbability Drive.

“I like the fact that it’s driven by Infinite Improbability,” Musk said in presenting his long-awaited Mars colonisation plan in September, “because I think our ship is also extremely improbable.”

“But the acronym is not the best,” he chuckled.

All aboard the HOG?

The name generated applause at the International Astronautical Congress in Mexico, where Musk provided elaborate details of his bold plans to fly scores of humans to Mars and set up a self-sustaining city with 1 million people, as big as San Jose, California.

For the past decade, Musk has borrowed from science fiction and fantasy when naming his rockets, engines, capsules and other space doodads.

Another billionaire’s aerospace startup, Blue Origin, pays homage to America’s original Mercury astronauts with its names. Long-established NASA and United Launch Alliance prefer mythology and astronomy.

Musk already has plumbed

Star Wars for names, as well as work by the late Scottish science fiction writer Iain M Banks.

SpaceX’s Falcon rocket is a nod to the

Millennium Falcon piloted by Han Solo. It’s powered by Merlin engines.

Then there are the two ocean platforms used for booster landings after liftoff: “Just Read the Instructions” and “Of Course I Still Love You” from Banks’ 1988 novel

The Player of Games.The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy dates back further; the late English author Douglas Adams published the novel in 1979, based on his hit radio series.

And there’s the

Dragon capsule currently used to haul cargo to the International Space Station for NASA and, in another year or two, US astronauts.

The capsule was named for Puff the Magic Dragon, a jab at those who scoffed when Musk founded the company in 2002 and set the space bar exceedingly high. SpaceX went on to become the first private company to launch a spacecraft into orbit and return it safely to Earth in 2010.

NASA traditionally has dipped into mythology for names: Projects Mercury and Apollo, and the Saturn V moon rocket. The space shuttles were named after seafaring ships of yore:

Columbia,Challenger,Discovery,Atlantis andEndeavour. Shuttle prototypeEnterprise was the exception, named after theStar Trek starship at fans’ request.

United Launch Alliance also favors mythology, with its longtime Atlas rocket and even bigger, still-in-development Vulcan.

Then there are the constellations for inspiration. Orion, the hunter, is the spacecraft in which NASA plans to send astronauts beyond low-Earth orbit, most notably Mars. Cygnus, the swan, is Orbital ATK’s capsule for space station shipments. Gemini, the twins, was NASA’s two-man-per-capsule programme that bridged

Mercury andApollo.

Orbital ATK also turned to the heavens for naming its Antares rocket after the super-bright star.

At Blue Origin, the reusable suborbital rocket and capsule are called New Shepard for Alan Shepard, the first American to fly in space. The orbital version will be New Glenn for John Glenn, the first American to orbit the Earth. Company founder Jeff Bezos suggests New Armstrong may soon be in the offing for

Apollo 11’s Neil Armstrong, the first man to step onto the moon.

Optimistically, according to Musk,

Heart of Gold could blast off from Florida in late 2024 and arrive at the red planet in 2025. A Mars-launching window is available only every 26 months.

“I would stress that’s an aspiration and within the realm of possibility, but a lot of things need to go right,” Musk said.

Musk knows better than anyone things don’t always go right in rocketry.

His

Falcon 9 rockets are grounded for the second time in a year, this time by a massive fireball during prelaunch testing at the pad on Sept 1.

“This is just a small thing on a long road,” Musk told reporters back in September. “There will probably be other failures in the future.”

He anticipates the risk will be greatest, in fact, for the pioneers aboard

Heart of Gold.

PAGE TWO:

Writer credits: Jean Goulbourne, Jonathan Elderfield, Charmaine Morris, Velma Pollard

Books:

>>>60-SECOND REVIEWS

Jamaican novel chock-full of folk history and culture [pic: road]

The Road to Timnath (Author House), by Sylvia Gilfillian

“Mi get mi belly full.”

These were the words of satisfaction uttered by a relative to whom I loaned my copy of Sylvia Gilfillian’s debut novel The Road to Timnath. This novel made the shortlist for the Una Marson Prize at the Lignum Vitae Awards of 2015 and is a must-read for anyone who wishes to be reminded of Jamaica’s rich folk history and culture.

Set mostly in the Jamaican countryside, this book however consists of much more than mere local colour. It is the story of the church and complicated relationships of love, hate, jealousy, murder, political turmoil, manipulation, superstition and heart-warming friendships.

Written partly in Jamaican Creole, the language is accessible, especially as the author provides a detailed glossary at the end of each chapter. It covers a time period from the beginning of the 20th century and presents events from as far back as the building of the Panama Canal to the political upheavals of the 1970 to the early 1980s.

At the opening of the novel, a woman who fled Jamaica after her young husband’s murder in 1980, returns home to aid her son, a young pastor who has impregnated his childhood best friend. Her journey home provides a door to a past that is linked to the present. It is a story of colourism, low self-esteem drilled into those of darker hue, their resulting internalised oppression, their fight for self-expression and the search for love that often results in rejection and rage. There is also a clash between traditional Christianity and folk religion.

The characters in this book are true-to-life and leave the reader thinking that these people must have existed. The sympathetic reader can identify with each one, from the bitterness of Miss Birdie, who is rejected by her husband’s congregation because of her black skin, to the determination of the mixed-race Joanie who has her sights set on Jimmy, Miss Birdie’s light-skinned grandson and heir to his grandfather’s ministry. Her desperate machinations bring great distress to her grandmother, Miss Maudie.

The Road to Timnath would not be the same without Jamaican creole, and the proverbs that begin each chapter do not only provide tantalising insights into the chapter but also speak volumes of the wit and wisdom of the Jamaican people. The book is difficult to put down once begun and yet one does not want it to end, so satisfying is it to read. It is indeed a bellyful.

—Jean Goulbourne

Fascinating new world created in ‘Moonglow’ [pic: moonglow]

Moonglow: a Novel (Harper), by Michael Chabon

In his latest novel,

Moonglow, author and Pulitzer Prize winner Michael Chabon aims for the moon and successfully touches down on the lunar surface after a journey that leaps across the decades, the story spanning South Philadelphia in the 1930s, Europe ravaged by World War II and the post-war America of the space programme before retirement to South Florida.

The story is told through memories passed down to Mike, the narrator, by his mother’s father. Suffering from bone cancer and high on painkillers, Mike’s grandfather reveals “a record of his misadventures, his ambiguous luck, his feats and failures of timing and nerve”.

Crossing continents and time itself, the story arcs from the search for the scientist who led the Nazi programme to build the V-2 rockets that terrorised Britain during the war. At the centre of the story is the loving but tortured relationship between the narrator’s grandparents. They met in post-war Baltimore and their marriage bonds suffer from the wife’s traumatic war-time experiences in German-occupied France in the form of hallucinations and acting out. However, the grandfather prepared for her bouts of madness: “She was always threatening rain; he had been born with an umbrella.” The emotional connection between the three generations is told, as we learn of Mike’s relationship with his mother and hers in turn with her parents. The grandmother’s psychotic episodes — involving fires and fantasy; disappearances and delusions — push Mike’s grandfather to the limit as he struggles to keep the family intact.

The Yiddish Policemen’s Union remains my favorite, but withMoonglow you get what you expect from Chabon: an emotional tale of love and loss; fabulous, at times magical, writing; and a story rooted in real-world events told from a unique perspective.Moonglow floats through time and space and fires its rockets when required; to blast from Earth’s gravity, to maintain course, to traverse the universe, to carry the reader to a fascinating new world.

—Jonathan Elderfield

>>>NEW IN BOOKS

A Way to Escape (LMH Publishing), by Michelle Thompson [pic: way to escape]

From local publisher LMH Publishing, in time for the book-gift season, comes this sweeping generational tale of the Tomlinson family and their sojourn in Kingston, between the 1950s and 1970s. The family’s dream seemingly becomes a reality when they move from the inner city to a middle-class neighbourhood in east Kingston. But the dream is short-lived when the patriarch Arthur, in a drunken fit one night, orders his wife Rose to leave the house. Rose and her four children flee, leaving everything behind. They repair to Rose’s mother’s one-room quarters, Rose finds work and they later move from one tenement to the next. Meanwhile, Arthur’s dependency on rum grows and his life spirals out of control. What follows reveals the splintering of the family as they each go their individual ways. Is the damage irreparable?

Jamaican-born author Thompson is a social worker who now makes her home in Toronto. A Way to Escape is her debut novel. She has also written two short stories,

Honey, andTwo Boys and a Dog.

PAGES THREE & FOUR:

Fiction:

Bridge to the clouds

By Charmaine Morris [pic: bridge]

Queenie didn’t move until she heard the front door close with a soft click. She rolled onto her back but kept her eyes closed. She held her breath, thinking in a few seconds he’d be back. But she knew better. Victor was gone. She’d seen him pack in the dark, and pretended sleep when he thought he was making too much noise. The other times he’d said he was leaving, they’d quarrell and eventually, he’d change his mind, ‘for the baby’, but not so now.

On cue, the child started bawling. Queenie covered her ears with her hands. She closed her eyes tight and willed the child to stop crying. She needed quiet to think about her situation and how she would manage without Victor. As if to spite, the child’s cries swelled and seemed to threaten every glass in the house. Tears streamed down Queenie’s face as she remembered the day she found out she was pregnant. She’d thought then that an abortion was the best thing. Victor changed her mind, though. And now, he was gone.

‘All right all right all right! Stop it!’ She picked the child from the crib and immediately felt the wet diaper. She plopped her down. The diaper Queenie ripped from the baby was heavy with urine and stank.

Outside, the fog was as thick as the clouds which often tumbled over the hills. Queenie watched it through the window. She couldn’t remember seeing fog this thick, creeping around like a thief on the prowl. It was so thick that for a moment she worried that Victor could fall down and hurt himself. Then with swift admonishment she hoped he broke his neck. And then she was sorry for her thoughts.

The baby started up again, stiffening her body and belting out her screams louder than an opera singer.

‘Shut up!’

The child messed herself on the bed. ‘What you do dat for, eeh? How you so nasty?’ Queenie stood in front of the crib, hands on hips, scowling at the child. Exactly how were they going to manage when Victor’s income had been the sole earning?

The child cried on.

Again, Queenie covered her ears. ‘Stop, stop, stop. Just stop,’ she said, pleading softly with the child, who now was writhing in her own mess and getting it all over the sheets. ‘Jesus Christ!’ Queenie slammed the wet diaper against the child’s face. ‘Stop! Just stop. Shhhh.’

Queenie’s tears started again. If only she could have a minute — one minute of quiet — she could figure out what to do. Why would Victor leave like that? Why sneak out in the early morning and not even tell her? Why? How him could leave the baby?

Finally, ehr cries quieted to sobs. Her breathing slowed. She sniffled, took a deep breath and sighed. Let him go, she thought, let him go. She removed her hand from the baby’s face to wipe her own with the hem of her dress. The diaper fell away.

The baby was still.

Queenie shook her but the child did not move.

Queenie screamed. She called for help but no one heard. The nearest house was a mile away. The only other living things were the birds and maybe the neighbour’s goats.

The baby was dead! Dead! And Victor was gone. Now, for sure, she had nothing. It was all Victor’s fault. No one else’s but Victor’s. She hated him. She would kill him if he ever came near her again… but what about the baby? The child she never really wanted but had kept only for Victor, the man she’d loved since she was a girl. What would she do with the baby?

She wrapped the child in the sheet she’d died on. She was careful going around the head. She rolled her in a blanket and put her in a black plastic bag. She opened the front door; peered out. No one was there. Only the thick fog.

Making her way carefully over the shrubs and stones, she went down through the path behind the house on to the track that led to the bridge, and the river below. She focused on the track, trying to remember the pits and curves. At the bridge, she fumbled against the rail and felt her way till she thought she was just about over the middle of the river. She held the bag with the baby over the rail; whispered a prayer. The baby was better off now. She let her go, listening for the splash. When it came, she couldn’t help the sob that escaped her lips.

‘Is who dat?’

Queenie froze. She’d forgotten about Trapper. Trapper, the neighbourhood madman, lived by the bridge in a dilapidated contraption made of zinc blown off roofs during the hurricane and old board he’d pulled from a garbage truck that had broken down nearby.

Queenie remained silent. Maybe he wouldn’t be able to see her in the fog and he’d go back to his shack.

‘Mi say, is who dat?’

Queenie held her breath.

‘Queenie, is you dat? Mi see you, you know? Is what you have deh? Give me some, nuh?’

Queenie expelled a shaky breath in a cough. ‘Don’t have not’ing to give you, Trapper.’ She could hear him shuffling towards her. He must have seen her when she’d passed his shack.

‘But mi did see you wid a bag. Is what you have in dere?’

‘You see me wid bag? Which bag?’

Trapper came up to Queenie. Close enough to touch her if he wanted. Slightly bent and gaunt, he always looked like a man who’d gotten a good dose of obeah. ‘You was carrying it like a pickney. Is what in dey?’

‘Me just out for a walk. Mi never have no bag.’

‘In dis fog? Who go walkin’ when dem cyaan see two inch from dem face?’

‘What you doin out here den?’

‘You know say me ’ave eagle eye. Me see everyting and me did see you wid some’n in yuh han.’ Trapper pointed an old crooked finger at Queenie. His fingers were like old rotting bramble. Queenie recoiled.

‘Me don’t have no time to argue wid no mad man.’ Queenie tried to pass, but Trapper stepped before her.

‘Is ’ide you ’iding it, right? You don’t wan me fi si. Anyway, mi know say is so you always out fo youself and nuh t’ink bout nobody else.’

‘Get out a mi way. You crazy, old man.’

‘So gi me some money t’buy breakfas’.’ This was how he harassed the residents in the community for a few dollars. But she had nothing, and she wasn’t about to put up with Trapper.

She shoved him aside.

‘Hey, gal!’

Queenie rounded on him. There was fire in her eyes, if only Trapper could see it. But she sensed he felt it, for he stepped back. ‘Hey gal, you mumma! Leave me alone!’

‘Gwey! You mad like!’

‘Yes. Mi mad and don’t forget it!’

Queenie marched away, the irony of Trapper calling her mad not lost on her. Still, it was how she felt. Mad… crazy… crazed.

Back at the house, Queenie paced up and down the living room. She couldn’t stop thinking about Victor and the baby. What would she tell people?

Explaining Victor was easy, for the two constantly quarrelled and one or the other was always leaving. They’d think he would return as usual. But the baby? That was harder. She could tell people they’d argued and Victor had left and taken the baby. Yes, that could work.

The first person she would tell was Paula, the self-appointed town crier. Any information you wanted spread around the community was told to Paula in the strictest confidence. She was faster than the radio and more thorough than a census taker. Queenie decided she would tell Paula that Victor had left and taken the baby.

Outside the fog started to thin and Queenie could see the trees at the gate… and a figure standing there. She couldn’t make out who it was. She could tell it was a man because she was able to see legs clad in pants. He stood there for a long time, till the fog at that spot cleared and she was able to make out his shape.

Victor! It was Victor, she was sure. He’d come back! Queenie wanted to run to him and hug him. Almost melting with relief she grinned and did a little jump and skip. Victor was back!

Then as suddenly as it came, the grin slipped from her face.

What if he’d only came back because of the baby?

The sound that came from Queenie brought Victor through the door like a cannon. He almost took it off the hinges. Inside, he found Queenie by the crib, crouched to the ground, wailing.

‘Is what? Is what?’

‘The baby gone,’ she said, almost inaudibly. Victor glanced furtively at the empty crib and grabbed her by the shoulder hard, his fingers digging into her skin.

‘What happen to the baby, Queenie?’ She could hear the fear in his voice, the concern about the child. It made her ill. It seemed she’d spent the whole morning crying and Queenie was beginning to feel drained. When she didn’t respond, Victor shook her. Her entire frame rattled. ‘What happen to the baby?’

‘Mi don’t know. Me go bade and when me come back de baby gone!’

‘Somebody take her?’

‘Mi nuh know, mi nuh know. What we going do?’ Queenie moaned.

Victor was frantic, hand on his head, looking like a man who’d lost his way.

‘Come.’ He pulled Queenie to her feet. ‘If somebody take her, him must be near.’

‘How we going find anybody in dis fog?’

‘The fog soon gone. Come on!’ Victor was out the door well before Queenie was able to struggle into her shoes. She ran to catch up to Victor, who had gone through the gate and was scrabbling down the path. She saw his bags at the concrete slab and paused. They confirmed her initial thought that he’d changed his mind and come home.

At the bridge, Queenie saw a figure come up the side opposite Trapper’s shack. Victor was already there, talking to the person. She could hear Victor, agitated and confused. When she drew near she saw Trapper holding something in his hand. Victor was asking Trapper if he’d seen anyone… a man with the baby… his baby. ‘You see anybody Trapper? Him would a just pass.’ But Victor was talking too fast and Trapper didn’t understand.

Victor took a breath. ‘Somebody take the baby,’ he said. ‘You see anybody come by here?’

‘Tek which baby?’

‘Stop the foolishness Trapper and listen! The baby gone! You see anybody on the bridge this morning?’ The bridge was the only way in and out of the community.

‘Nuh really.’ Trapper’s eyes met Queenie’s.

‘Mi don’t have time for this.’ Victor grabbed Queenie’s hand and took off.

They met Paula some distance from the bridge. ‘Is what happen to oonuh? Oonuh in race?’

‘The baby gone!’ Victor said. ‘Somebody take her!’

‘Lord-a God!’ Paula took off running back where she’d come from. Within minutes everyone would know and they’d start a search. Queenie bit a finger nail. She remembered the time Butcher’s son had stolen Winston’s cow and how everyone searched for days until they found the boy hiding down by the river with the carcass. They’d beaten him to a pulp before handing him over to the police. She shuddered at the memory.

Victor took Queenie’s free hand and squeezed. ‘It goin’ be all right. We will get her back.’ He pulled her close and hugged her. ‘She soon come home.’ But she heard the doubt in his voice and felt the heavy beat of his heart.

‘If somebody take the baby, him must pass by the bridge and Trapper must did hear. Nothing no miss him. Me a go back go talk to him.’

On approaching the shack, Victor called out Trapper’s name. The man didn’t answer. Victor called again. Still nothing. He shoved the door. It swung open.

‘Maybe him gone…’

‘No, him is there. I can hear him breathing. Victor stepped through the door and into Trapper’s living room, dining room, kitchen, bathroom and bedroom. A single bed was to one corner and on the edge of it sat Trapper, as though he was about to slide off.

‘Trapper, you never hear me calling?’

Trapper turned and when he did his eyes met Queenie’s. In that moment she knew why Trapper had been coming from down the river earlier. But before she could say anything, Victor had moved closer to the bed. He intended to get Trapper’s attention, to ask him about earlier that morning. Suddenly, Victor exclaimed. ‘Jesus Christ! Is what you do?’

Queenie inched closer.

On the bed lay the baby. She was still swaddled in the blanket in the black plastic bag that Trapper had torn open to get to what he must have thought was something worth keeping. The smell of the baby’s faeces permeated the air. She stepped back.

Sobbing, Victor grabbed the baby and pressed his ear to her chest. ‘She dead! She dead! Jesus, she dead! Is what you do? What you do to mi baby?’ His words were directed at Trapper, who sat motionless on the bed, his eyes on Queenie.

Suddenly, Victor thrust the baby at Queenie. She tossed it on the bed. Victor raised a hand and brought it down to the side of Trapper’s face. The force of the blow threw the man to the ground. ‘A nuh me!’ Trapper said in a loud shrill voice, but Victor silenced him with a kick to the face.

Trapper made a sound like gargling, then spat blood. Victor pulled back and kicked Trapper once more, this time in the stomach. Something cracked. Victor bent down, and grabbed Trapper by the shoulder. ‘Why you kill mi baby? Why?’ Spittle flew from his mouth. He thumped Trapper in the face. Then he dragged him outside. Gripping Victor’s hands, Trapper tried to speak. But his words were a jumble amidst the missing teeth and blood. Trapper tried to point at Queenie. But Victor was beyond reason.

Outside Victor flailed on Trapper, who had long since stopped resisting.

‘Lord have mercy, Victor! Stop it! What you beating Trapper for?’ Paula had returned, with about 10 residents in tow.

‘Him kill the baby!’

‘You sure?’ Some people had gotten between Victor and Trapper. Paula was in Victor’s face. She glanced at Queenie, who was shrinking into the shadows, then back at Victor, seeking some confirmation that what he said was true. ‘Go look inside,’ Victor said calmly, his face still dark with rage.

‘Gwaan go look,’ someone said, and Paula obeyed. ‘Trapper wouldn’t do something like that,’ somebody murmured. ‘Him did always crazy,’ someone else countered.

Just then Paula returned, looking like death herself. ‘The baby in dey,’ she said, her voice barely a whisper. She held on to the side of the shed. ‘She dead, she dead.’ Paula doubled over as if it were her child, her loss.

‘Is him do it, fi true?’ She directed her question to Queenie, who was still biting her nail and shaking like a woman sick from fever.

‘Is him do it, Queenie? Is Trapper kill the baby?’ Closing her eyes tight, she nodded. Then she clamped her hands over her ears to prevent herself from hearing Trapper’s howls as the crowd descended on him.

Hair Free

By Velma Pollard

“Dem head pull up.”

At least outside,

if not inside.

Natural, unbound, unranked

and uncontained,

open, in twists or fat plaits,

up, down, north, south and sideways

hair pull up.

Never like cane rows,

natural neat and bound.

That mother let me know

that freedom takes all shapes,

that movement from the ordered bun

holding wild strands in place

from neat plaits tightly bound

from cane row, corn row, Afro styled

marks bursting free

from Euro rules that say

how hair should be.

Not theirs but ours,

the lesser we.

Hair unrestrained, she told me,

screams its statement.

I don’t care

for rules of hair

proclaimed

imposed

by who for whom?

This hair

is me!!!