You may have heard of Helen Oyeyemi’s most recent book, White is for Witching, as it seems to have begun to make its way round the blogosphere. But it is all checked out at my library. I decided to make a virtue of necessity and read Oyeyemi’s three books in the order she wrote them, starting with The Icarus Girl which, I discovered, she wrote before she was twenty and published when she was twenty-two.
Jessamy Harrison is a lonely little girl trying to find her place. Daughter of a Nigerian mother and a British father, she is never sure exactly where she belongs, and she struggles to make friends as she is a year younger than her classmates. During a visit to her mother’s family in Nigeria, Jess meets a girl of her own age called TillyTilly, who has powers that other people don’t have. As Jess tries to have a normal life back in England, Tilly becomes more and more possessive, and more threatening. It’s all nice and paranormal (paranormal is a word that is not all standards, but has a pleasing symmetry that makes it nearly as good as if it were all standards).
This is a young book – not very introspective, which I suppose is partly because the viewpoint character is only eight. The reader spots Tilly’s menace (all standards!) long before Jess does, but this isn’t handled well. Instead of fearing for Jess, I was frustrated with her. Neither was the supernatural stuff handled well. I’ve said before that I do not mind it in fiction if supernatural occurrences are rather vague – Diana Wynne Jones does this almost every time, for example, to great effect. What I do not like is to have it be vague, vague, vague, and then suddenly, snap, it gets explained and resolved in about two seconds at the end. Which is sort of what happens here.
Oh, dear, I’ve gone and been quite negative, but you see, I’ve only done that because I just finished The Opposite House, and I know how insightful slightly-older Helen Oyeyemi can be, and it’s thrown the flaws of The Icarus Girl (which is quite a good book!) into sharp relief. You see, this is what happens when I put off writing reviews. I read other, better things. Though in the case of Gunnerkrigg Court, I put off writing the review and subsequently discovered the rest of the webcomic and grew to like it better and better. Procrastination: Sometimes it pays.
What you should take away from this is that Helen Oyeyemi is a superb writer, and she’s young and has years and years, books and books, ahead of her, and she is already a strong writer in The Icarus Girl, and she is just going to get better. Read The Icarus Girl at some point, but her second book is more finished and grown-up; and I suspect her third will be even better.
Other reviews by people who have maybe not just read The Opposite House and whose opinions are thus possibly more helpful:
Lotus Reads
Stuck in a Book
Serendipity
Tell me if I missed yours!
Jenny's Books 
I grabbed this book off a swap site after reading Vivienne’s review. It sounds really good, but i guess I’ll want to make sure I read it before any of her other books…
I think you’d still enjoy it if you didn’t read it first, as long as you’re bearing in mind that it’s a first novel. When I discovered one of my now-favorite authors, Martin Millar, I read his best book first, and then went on to the rather less good ones. And despite its flaws, I still really enjoyed reading his first novel.
I have White is for Witching lined up to read and I’m glad that I read this first as it is the work of a debut writer and an immature one at that – amazingly Oyeyemi wrote The Icarus Girl whilst at school!
I know! I looked her up to see if she was from Nigeria like Jess or Cuba like Maja, and I couldn’t believe how young she was. Good for her.
I read The Icarus Girl several years ago and really enjoyed it. Thanks for pointing out that Oyeyemi is an author that continues to grow…and I’ll be looking for her next two books!
I hope you can get hold of them! Like I said, The Opposite House was better, and I have heard so many great things about White is for Witching (love that title too) that I am expecting it to be better yet.
White is for Witching is everywhere at the moment! It is nice to know that this one is good and I’ll keep an eye out for her books in the future.
It’s times like these I’m really glad for the blogosphere, because outside of book blogs, I’ve not even heard Helen Oyeyemi’s name. SO glad I found her.
I have seen her name everywhere and yet have not read a novel by her – thank you for the honest review! I’ll start with something from her more recent work.
From everything I hear, White is for Witching is a good place to start, as long as you don’t mind its being better than her others. I’m just sad I only have one more book of hers to read. Hopefully she will write another soon as she is young and energetic.
Oh by the way, that last comment was Litlove. Sigh. Husband colonised the computer again!
love your tags…. The twins in Her Fearful Symmetry were certainly creepy but not sure, in general, that I would think so. I like when a book reaction over time can change rather than just be forgotten.
I mentioned the twins thing because my mum always says she was fascinated by these twins that were in her kindergarten class. “They looked exactly the same!” she says. “But they were different people!” I don’t know – there were twins in my elementary school class, and I was unmoved by the same-face-different-brain thing. (Though, yeah, Julia and Valentina were creepy.)
After Eva’s review, I added White is for Witching to my list. I love that you’re reading them in order – and that Helen is progressing as a writer. I love seeing that in novels.
I love it too. I’m wondering if I will find such a drastic improvement between The Opposite House and White is for Witching, or if she’ll be plateau-ing now. Of course White is for Witching is checked out of my library, so I’ll have to wait and see.
I HAVE to read The Opposite House now!
Do! I just reviewed it – such lovely writing.
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