Middle Grade Review: I Lived on Butterfly Hill

 

Title: I Lived on Butterfly Hill 

Author:  Marjorie Agosin. Translated from the Spanish by E. M. O'Connor (as far as I can determine, the English edition is the only edition, and the book has not been published in Spanish).

Publisher: Aetheneum Books for Young Readers, 2014. 454 pages.

Source: Library

Summary:

Eleven-year-old Celeste Marconi has a great life in Valparaiso, Chile. She loves words, school, her family and friends, and everything about her life on Butterfly Hill. But when the country is taken over by Pinochet and his violent dictatorial regime, life begins to unravel. Before it is done unraveling, she is separated from her family and living in Maine, in the United States. Celeste must learn to cope with a very different climate, culture and language before she can put her life together again, even as her country must put itself back together again.

Review:

This is a beautiful book. The author is first and foremost a poet, and it shows (major kudos to the translator, as well, who has made the language work beautifully. That is no small feat in a work that is so concerned with words and language). I can really see the city of Valparaiso in the first part of the book, and each character is well painted in words, not so much their appearance, as their natures.

 The story is very moving as well. Celeste is just at the point of waking up to the privileged life she leads, and is feeling the need to think and write about it, in contrast to the lives of the poor around her. When Pinochet takes over the country in a very right-wing coup, it becomes "subversive" to even talk about equality and helping the poor. She struggles with her awakening to the world around her just as that world gets ugly.

When Celeste is sent to Maine, again we see it as especially hard for a child who is in love with words and language--though that love serves her well as she learns English. The time there is passed over rather quickly. I had assumed, reading the blurb, that the book was really about her adjustment to life in the US. In fact, it is about her life in Chile--and learning the meaning of family, country, and caring. There is a gripping and suspenseful side to the story, as Celeste's parents must go into hiding, and she leaves her grandmother and Nana behind when she goes into exile, but in the end my feeling was that the story wasn't so much about that as about her inner growth. And, as mentioned, the meaning of love and family.

Recommendation:
This isn't a completely easy story. The nastiness of the Pinochet regime isn't graphic, but it's not glossed over, either. I would recommend this mostly for kids of about Celeste's age--from 11 up, as some of the ideas and imagery might be a bit strong for younger children. There is just a hint of romance, more a whiff of Celeste's awakening to the idea that boys might be something other than pals.

Full Disclosure: I checked I Lived on Butterfly Hill out of my library, and received nothing from the writer or publisher in exchange for my honest review.  The opinions expressed are my own and those of no one else.  I am disclosing this in accordance with the Federal Trade Commission's 16 CFR, Part 255: "Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising."

Flash Fiction Friday: The Machines of Jest

Time for another Flash Fiction challenge from Chuck Wendig, king of brilliant and profane writing advice, and home of the best weekly writing challenges.  This week, he gave us a list of 20 potential sources of conflict for a story, and I spun the virtual wheel of fortune.  Change gave me "machines are taking over."  So I give you. . . 


The Machines of Jest
I may be the only living person who really knows what happened on Surely You Jest.  The planet, originally 165432Bb, was named by the first settlers for their reaction to its rocky surface.  It had been classed as suitable for human habitation, but it clearly wasn’t going to be anyone’s vacation paradise.  Later, when 165432Bc was settled and found to be marginally more pleasant, the settlers named it Don’t Call Me Shirley.  Naturally, the two became known as Jest and Shirley.

The effort required to make Jest genuinely habitable was immense.  To meet it, the settlers developed and deployed machines on a scale that at that time had been tried nowhere in the galaxy, and they were sophisticated machines.  An ordinary tractor-bot couldn’t handle the rocks or the slopes.  Jest tractors had what amounted to human reflexes to stabilize them.  And so on.  Since the incident on Jest, I think they make settlement machines a little differently, and usually send them in alone.  But back then, they dumped off settlers on any habitable world with a selection of resources, and left them to figure out how to make a go of it.

By the time the region around the original settlement, Jester, was rendered both habitable and arable, the residents had figured out how they could inside and do the work remotely.  Right from the start, in the manner of humans everywhere, the Jesterites had worked to make the machines more independent, to free the operators to do other things.  Early models required a driver on board, directly controlling operations.  Then they started to drive them remotely, but still in real time.  Gradually, they learned to program the machines for a full day’s work and just let them run.

At some point, several generations from Landing, someone realized that no one was programming the machines at all anymore.  They didn’t make a big deal about it.  Some worried a bit, but most agreed that it was a good thing, freeing the citizens to create a rich culture.  And it was proof of their own skills, to be the first in the galaxy to make truly independent machines.

I learned all this from the Galactic Records library while I was on my way to Jest with a load of—well, never mind what.  I always read up about my destinations, and I the idea of independent machines made me a little uncomfortable.  But, I’m from Last Stop, where we always keep our fingers on the buttons and figure work is a good thing.  At least, the Elders think that about work.  I figured adventure was a better thing, so I took to space freighting.  I’m Indie, so I get around, wherever the cargos want hauling and the price is right.  But I’ve only gone to Jest once.

A thousand square miles of terra-formed farmland surrounded the city of Jester, providing everything they needed.  And not one single human moved in all that land.  Just the machines, going about their business.  It bugged me.  I felt a bit squirmy even before I landed.

Last Stop, which was actually a rather early stop in terms of galactic settlements, had been inhabited for about 100 generations.  Jest has only been human space for five.  Five generations maybe wasn’t enough to forget that the first generation had short, nasty lives, cut off by lung disease from the dust and cancers from the radiation of 165432B, which was stronger than that of Sol on Earth.  People who stayed inside lived longer.  It’s not so surprising that staying inside became a goal for most inhabitants.

It only took me a couple of days in Jester to see it, though.  The machines were up to something.  There was less work being done, and a surprising stream of machines coming in with repair requests.  Sometimes the Techs couldn’t even recall what the machines had needed.

I watched a machine go back out after “repairs.”  It headed straight for the horizon and disappeared.  Maybe it worked out there.

An hour later, another did the same.  After the third machine in as many hours had followed the same path, I got out my ground scooter, the one-man air bike with double hover, and followed.  Two hours of fast travel bought me an answer I wasn’t sure I wanted.

Forty-six large machines congregated in a valley far from Jester.  While I watched from what I hoped was a hidden point, a forty-seventh joined them.  They all looked like they were designed to destroy things.  I figured they were supposed to be the ones pushing the frontiers, turning Jest’s rock into soil.  I moved a little closer.

One of the machines rotated its scanning cameras to view me, and rotated slightly to improve the view.  Immediately dozens of scanners locked on me, and I began to sweat.  When the first one moved, I hit the rocket-boost on my bike and got out of there.  I stayed as high as the bike would fly all the way back to the city.

#

I couldn’t convince anyone in Jester that there was a problem.  None of the techs could recall exactly what they’d done to the machines, besides “routine maintenance,” but that didn’t seem to bother them.  In the end, I did the only thing I could do.

I got out of there and left Jest to its fate.

Oh, I notified the Galactic Central Settlement Commission, but I doubted they would do much.  Bureaucracies move slowly, and I had a feeling the situation on Jest was going to change fast. Maybe they’d be in time to evacuate some of the people to Shirley, if they could convince any they needed to go.

As for me, I’m not taking any more commissions to that system.  The machines are taking over, and I don’t want to think what might happen if the contagion spreads.


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