By Request

Polly Courtney's Feral Youth dives headlong into the life of 15 year old Alesha, a young girl from South London just trying to rep her endz and keep all the right affiliations with Peckham Crew. From the start, it is made clear that Alesha is a hard edged fighter of a youth, shaped and roughened by circumstance and necessity. An absent father and a mother that's negligent at best paint a vague background of Alesha's past, engraining an idea that without true family, street fam is all she has. That's where JJ comes in - best friend, brother figure, and the closest thing Alesha has to a real family. It is her connections with JJ that drive most of her wishes and decisions as she struggles her way through street life, bouncing from dodgy flats to hostels, robbing, shoplifting and running errands for the Crew to make ends meet.

At it's heart, Feral Youth is a coming of age story which documents the struggles of an inner city youth pushed around from place to place, and her journey to gain confidence in her self and the ability to change the outcome of her life. Bouncing between legitimizing her life with the help of her once piano teacher Miss Merfield and giving in to the ease of money making through drug deals, black market sales, and general thievery, the reader watches Alesha flip flop her way through the novel, unable to gain the drive to pull herself out of her current lifestyle - one she is smart enough to be scared of, but not strong enough to want to leave: it's familiar, its immediately gratifying, and she's GOOD at it.

Courtney engulfs the reader in the world of Alesha, and gang affiliated life, painting the scene through Alesha's own thoughts and eyes - her very specific catalogue of diction and slang terms reinforcing the believability of her circumstance. We are inside her mind, and feel what she does which often times is the only way the reader would be able to understand the thought process or presumed logic of situations.

While the novel does well to depict the life of a disadvantaged young girl, and further contrast it to the (assumed) privilege born into others, there is an oversimplification which pervades the story. Alesha is motivated by survival - and on occasion, a need to ensure other's (JJ's) survival. Survival in itself is not a simple motivator, and yet the novel fixates on the living from day to day so much that greater motivations, intents, and emotions fall short. As a reader you care about Alesha because you feel sorry for her, and pity is not exactly the primary emotion you want a reader to feel for your character. Of course, there are situations and plots that need sympathy, but I wanted to properly connect with Alesha, understand her, and instead I found myself unsure when she would throw a tantrum and walk out on benefactor Miss Merfield and when she would have one of her 'the mother I never had' moments. While mood swings and angst are natural for a 15 year old girl, too much became for story convenience, and the continual back and forth bordered on the repetitive rather than enhancing Alesha's lack of self confidence. There were moments of course - times with Tisha primarily where I remembered that Alesha was still just a lost 15 year old girl, but these moments were too brief or too surface to fully grab hold of.

 Similarly, the revelation which final converts Alesha after various false starts, failed attempts and cases of giving up, is a simple reveal of a character who is successful, or at least appears to be, living in a posh world with nice clothes, despite having originally come from an estate. While this is a legitimate device to spur a character change in Alesha, the scene falls a bit flat after the months of pep talks, examples and support Alesha has been given to pull out of Crew life. I was frustrated by her because she did not seem to WANT to help herself for much of the novel - it is one thing to try and fail and get discouraged, but without full insight into her emotional side, these instances of failure felt less like tragic crippling self doubt, and more like a child too lazy to put in any hard work. I wanted to KNOW Alesha, what makes her tick, and was only offered brief glimpses of this in piano keys and her connection with JJ. Both could have been explored with more detail as they were reoccurring, though often unexplored themes throughout.

The emphasis on the riot itself, provided a window into youth and gang culture in a way which began to explore pack mentality, the contagion of rage and a need for action, the BBM messages highlighting the rapidity with which a collective can form, swell, and above all unite against a common theme. The tables were turned in order to show the deep rooted frustrations of a culture and society constantly put down and suppressed by ruling powers and the inevitable explosion that follows. Here the reader began to see more of Alesha - smashing in windows releasing pent up rage at all the people and things that have pushed her down. It is the depiction of those who destroy things out of envy - destruction of what they cannot have - and it is a powerful concept. But the truth remains that crime was crime - it was not food stolen for survival, but cell phones and technologies. While we feel for the caged bird, it can be hard from a readers perspective not to also call for justice.

This then is the dichotomy which encompassed my view of the novel. While I emphasized with the hardships of Alesha's life, I wanted more from her in terms of motivation. While I applauded Miss Merfield's benevolence, I chastised Alesha for her laziness. She had moments of gratitude, of pride, of will, yet I struggled throughout to support someone so blatantly turning to crime and drug trafficking. There may have been necessity there, but battling on through adversity is admirable - giving up is allowable - but lacking the ability to try - the DESIRE to, is frustrating.

Overall, Courtney does well to create a window into Alesha's world - the world of South, of streets, of Crew and of poverty, but I want more than a window; I want to step into that world and get lost there.