Book cover: https://www.nb.co.za/en/view-book/?id=9780624095163
Marked by Gillian D’achada
Tafelberg, 2024
ISBN: 9780624095163
This reader impression was written and sent to LitNet on the writer's own initiative.
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Thoroughly recommended.
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Marked is Gillian’s second youth novel. Her debut novel, Sharkey’s son, was published in 2008, after winning the Sanlam Youth Literature Competition in 2007. Sharkey has had tremendous success. It is a very popular classroom reader and has already surpassed the 30 000 copy mark.
We had to wait 17 years for a new novel from Gillian’s pen. Not that she has been sitting idle in the meantime. She is a copywriter in the very competitive advertising industry, where she manages the accounts of a few major clients. She is also a writer of theological texts, being an active member of the church where her husband serves as pastor.
But back to Marked. The story starts with a bang and the pace is frenetic. The introductory paragraph sets the tone.
James was anxious and his birthmark gave it away. Usually, it was the colour of a dark bruise, but right now it was glaring liver-red against his oatmeal skin, ugly as an alien.
The story revolves around 13-year-old James and his birthmark. Hence the title, Marked. But James’s life is turned upside down on the first page. His mother instructs him to pack, as they are leaving Johannesburg – indefinitely. She has planned an inexplicable, bizarre, one-way trip to Cape Town. In Cape Town, James is confronted with a grandmother he never knew he had, a coloured one to boot. He expresses his confusion on page four:
“Coloured?” James finished her sentence. “A week ago, I was a white guy from Johburg. Now I don’t know what I am.”
Jamie discovers that his granny is known as Aunty Baby by all in Die Land, as their little corner of Kalk Bay is called. Kalk Bay is a melting pot of languages, cultures, religions and social classes, a condensed microcosm of our country. This is the setting in which he meets his new best friend, Nonhle Mooi, a delightful character who introduces him to the village and to the sea. The characters whom she avoids also become familiar to Jamie. They are the “ugly man” Yusuf, a well-known poacher, and his nephew, Faried. As the story unfolds, Faried’s untenable relationship with his criminal uncle becomes apparent. As Faried says on page 85: “Ons issie almal so sleg nie, wiet jy?” In the end, Nonhle, Faried and James form a tight friendship.
The storyline also includes perlemoen poachers, drug dealers, dangerous sorties at sea and a near drowning. The climax of the story is when James is thrown overboard and feels himself drowning. His agnostic upbringing is suddenly overshadowed by his granny’s fervent faith and regular prayers. He starts praying:
God, James breathed, as he began to sink, if you really exist, please save me so that I can fulfil my great purpose in Your world. (113)
This is where the Muslim boy, Faried, risks his own life by literally throwing Jamie a lifeline, with a buoy attached. Washed ashore on the rocks, James discovers a whale calf trapped in a narrow gully. With the help of Faried, they manage to push the calf out of the gully to its frantic mother in the open sea. A CCTV camera accidentally catches the rescue on video. It is only the vivid birthmark on Jamie’s back that identifies him as one of the rescuers. This eventually stands him in good stead, as he is selected for the new private school, SALT – Sea Academy of Life Training. He makes his peace with his birthmark when he realises that his own mark is similar to the one that the whale calf had.
There are a number of strong themes in the book. Identity is one of them. James has to figure out his racial, religious and cultural identity.
Racial identity: James has to establish a new identity. The boykie from Johannesburg, who thought of himself as white, now discovers that he has a very mixed and colourful ancestry, including Filipino and slave blood. But as Nonhle says: who cares?
Nonhle snorted. “It’s nonsense. We’re all South Africans, aren’t we? Who cares what colour we are?” (43)
Linguistic and cultural identity: James and his granny speak only Afrikaans to each other. He feels left out having been brought up English. He discovers that his mom left her maternal home once she decided to get married, never to return. She was fair-skinned and could pass as white. In Die Land, people speak Afrikaans and English with equal ease. He discovers his granny’s traditional Cape style of cooking, which he absolutely loves. It becomes a symbol of his yearning for his roots.
Conservation of the sea is another theme which is woven through the tapestry of this novel. As in Gillian’s previous novel, the poaching of species and the destruction of the sea and her creatures feature very prominently. This is offset against the children’s own efforts to stand up to the villains.
Another theme which is consistent in both novels is the absence of a father figure. In Sharkey’s case, his father disappeared, presumed dead. In Jamie’s case, his father is deliberately left behind in Johannesburg, as the parents try to sort out their marital strife. As behoves a good youth novel, the action is mostly in the hands of the teen characters.
The story has a happy, believable and satisfactory conclusion.
Who should read the book? It is a classic youth novel, suitable for readers – boys as well as girls – in the 11-plus category for first language, and 13-plus for first additional language. It is a story with a universal appeal that will charm older readers, too. All those with a love for the sea and a heart that still remembers what it felt like to be 13 and desperate to fit in, will love it. It is a true South African delicacy, like tamatiebredie and koesisters. Teachers who have used Sharkey in their classes will feel very comfortable moving on to Marked. It is a solid classroom reader. It has enough flesh on the bone to tick all the boxes of the curriculum, while offering the children a fast-paced, enjoyable read. Thoroughly recommended.
