The Vanishing Act

Mette Jakobson

Text Publishing

Otago Daily Times , July 23rd 2011

As a school child I loved the enigmatic and haunting stories of writers such as Tove Jansson (Momintroll) and Antoine Saint-Exupéry (The Little Prince). Given my time again, I would add Mette Jakobsen to the list.

The Vanishing Act is a small but beautiful fable brought back a wealth of familiar feelings. It is set on a small island that has occupied only by a young girl called Minou, her philosopher father, a priest who is afraid of the dark, a former magician who makes boxes for sawing women in half and his dog called No Name. Minou’s mother used to live there too, but she went for a walk one morning and never returned. The adults think she is dead, but Minou is certain she will return and is writing down everything that happens so she can tell her about it when she gets back.

For the adults the island is a sanctuary; Minou’s parents are refugees (from what war and when we are not told), Boxman has a broken heart and Priest keeps the lights of the church on all night to ward off the terrors have driven him there. For Minou, it encompasses everything she knows, although the security of her universe has been undermined her mother’s disappearance. Then one day the outside intrudes in the shape of a dead boy washed up on the shore. While they wait for the supply boat to collect his body Minou and her father take turns to sit with him, he in the hopes of finding Truth, she to keep him company. But it is Minou and not her father, who finds answers that she needs.

The story is told by Minou and moves between the three days of waiting, the history of the island and the events leading up to her mother’s departure (which Minou believes is her fault). Her narrative is like a childrens’ drawing, full of bright primary colours and surprising details enlarged to unusual size; her mother’s arrival on the island in a rowboat accompanied only by a peacock in a golden bowl, her neighbours named only for their occupation, the scarves Minou knits for everybody including the dog.

She reports things without fully understanding them, leaving much unsaid but rich with implication, and can be read as fairy-tale, a piece of magical realism reminiscent of Angela Carter, or as an allegory for the first, tentative intrusions of adult concerns into the world of childhood.  It also deals sensitively with the emotions that accompany the loss of a parent and would be an ideal story to share with a child going through the grieving process.

It is difficult to define who the intended audience for this novel is, for older readers will get as much enjoyment out of it as the young adult audience it will probably be marketed towards. This is a novel that will stay in my shelves for my daughter to read one day.

https://www.odt.co.nz/entertainment/books/angels-and-allegory