This was a hard read, graphic violence, but an interesting supernatural revenge novel with a male protagonist.

Paul Cornell has written comics for Vertigo, DC, and Marvel, and for the Doctor Who TV series. That was enough to interest me in an advance copy of this novel. None of his previous work prepared me for this, although Vertigo comes closest. It tells the story of a British schoolboy named Andrew Waggoner during the Margaret Thatcher years (the 1980s). Andrew is a social outcast at school, desperately trying to avoid the school bullies, led by a boy named Drake. But one night they force him into the woods outside of school, and their taunting leads to a horrific act of physical mutilation--far outside the usual bounds of bullying. Andrew chooses to hide the event from his parents and the authorities, a decision that is psychologically convincing in context: such an accusation would mean he could never hope to fit in.

But it sends him into a dark place. Andrew finds himself in the the hills of the West Country, where a chalk horse marks a site of ancient power. There his dark half emerges, a being he always refers to as Waggoner, as if he was a separate, distinct person that normally only Andrew can see and hear. Waggoner is the soul of vengeance and rage. He tells Andrew that he can only be healed and made whole through sacrifice. One by one Andrew's torturers are killed in terrible ways, which somehow are always made to look like accidents.

At the same time Andrew is trying to make his way at school. Surprisingly, he becomes part of Drake's crew. Drake's girlfriend is obsessed with tracking the Number One hits on the pop music chart each week, which she treats like auguries of the future; Andrew also marks his life by them. There are also frequent references to Doctor Who, which I imagine would be appropriate to the time and place even if Cornell was not connected to the show. All of this teenage angst forms an ironic counterpoint to the horror. And in fact Andrew often seems emotionally disconnected from it, since it's being done by his double, not him. The story often keeps that connection blurry: is Waggoner a psychological construct that frees Andrew to do things he could not, or is he a real independent being? It's never completely resolved, but the climax makes it appear that the ancient world of magic is real--and Andrew makes his choice.

Chalk is deeply unsettling, which is surely a sign of its power, although it also makes me hesitant to recommend it. The closest comparison I can make is to the work of Clive Barker, where humans can fall into the deepest pits of evil.

I've really loved reading Paul Cornell's Lychford series, but Chalk is something completely different. There's a similar sense of deeply felt connection to small-town and rural England, and Cornell uses some of the same folk mythology-rooted imagery here as his fantastical element, but Chalk is an altogether darker, deeper and more personal story than the Lychford novellas. It's at times a difficult read, with quite a lot of distressing description of bullying and abuse of various kinds, but it's also a highly thoughtful and deeply powerful exploration of the damage that can be caused to individuals and a community in a culture that silences victims and ignores or normalizes abuse. It's not an enjoyable book, though it's definitely possible to enjoy the skill that Cornell brings to crafting the story, but it is an important book.

Chalk
Paul Cornell

In a forgotten world, a boy seeks to live a normal life. The forgotten world is Britain in the 1970s and the boy lives in rural England. His daily life is full of pain, that being the specialist subject of the school bully, Drake and his gang. Andrew Waggoner tries to be invisible. He hopes the group would move on to another of the school losers. It's pure self-preservation. Andrew is a fish out of water. Moving from public to state school he is targeted for both who he is and who he is not. It all comes down to fear of the unknown and it’s not just Andrew’s fear.

This boy has within him a sense of the absurd, a joy of life that sees him retain some optimism about how things might turn out. He thinks so deeply that he cannot see that he is setting himself up for even more distress. A disastrous choice of outfit for the annual Halloween Fancy Dress school disco makes sure he is the object of the gang’s attention but no one could imagine the result. The awful encounter with Drake and his gang leaves him terribly injured and the reader stunned.

This is the night that creates something new. Andrew is damaged but a primeval force for vengeance is made which opens the doors to bringing some greater evil to rural Wiltshire.

Deeper than deep this book drips with pain. If you have ever been bullied in any way you will find this traumatic. Chalk is a clever and disturbing vision of how violence begets violence and silence leads to deeper trauma. As children, we don't always believe adults can solve our problems with other children. We may agonise about why we are chosen to be the victim. We may be relieved when it passes on to someone else and feel the related survivor guilt. Bullying wrecks lives and although this book is also about the supernatural it is always the very human situation that really hits home.

I though this story worked very well. Creating something that takes revenge is in the heart of every child who is bullied. The mixing up of this with the supernatural elements works well to continue to create feat and uncertainly. The ending is powerful and perhaps unexpected. A really interesting and enjoyable outing for Paul Cornell.

The nitty-gritty: Disturbing, violent, weird and hallucinatory. This story is tough to handle.

I did not enjoy this book at all, I’m very sorry to say. Chalk was one of my most anticipated Spring Tor.com titles, and based on the author and the description of an unflinching look at bullying and abuse, I honestly thought I'd love this. I was expecting a grim, coming-of-age horror story, and while that’s exactly what this is, it completely lacked any feeling of hope and missed the mark for me when it came to the characters. I hated every single character, even the MC, who is the target of the bullies. There is no doubt that this is a powerful story that addresses a serious issue, but I could not finish it fast enough. I simply wanted to be done so I could start reading something else.

The story takes place in the early 80s in the small town of Calne in Wiltshire, England. Fourteen year old Andrew Waggoner attends school in another town and tries hard to keep out of the way of the school bully, an unpleasant lug named Drake. But one evening after a Halloween party, Andrew is dragged into the nearby woods by Drake and his “lot”—Lang, Selway, Blewly and Rove—and becomes the target of an unspeakable act of violence. Andrew knows that if he tells his teachers or parents what happened, he’ll risk losing the annual school award that he’s trying so hard to get. And so he keeps quiet. But that moment in the woods releases a beast, and Andrew suddenly has a double who seems to be his alter ego, a boy who looks just like him and calls himself Waggoner. Waggoner vows to get revenge on all five boys, after which Andrew will be healed, as if the act of violence had never happened.

Andrew can see Waggoner, but no else can, and as the days go by, Waggoner begins to set the stage for Andrew’s revenge. One by one, the bullies fall prey to Waggoner’s schemes, but other strange things are happening as well. The very walls of the school are changing, and odd chalk drawings are appearing on the grounds. Is Waggoner responsible? Or is there something else at play? Waggoner tells Andrew that everything will be resolved on Halloween, one year from the day he was brutally attacked.

So I do want to start by talking about the things I appreciated in Chalk, if not outright liked. Cornell has got the time period down pat. He sets his story during a time of economic hardship, which makes everything even more depressing. Andrew and his friends live and die by the music pop charts, and just about every new section begins with Andrew telling the reader which song is number one for the week. So there’s lots of mention of 80s bands and artists that I remember fondly: XTC, the Pretenders, Modern Romance, Michael Jackson, Duran Duran and many more. What’s even more interesting, however, is the way these songs play into the story. Andrew has an interesting relationship with a girl named Angie who believes songs carry hidden meanings. I'm not sure I understood Angie's ramblings about song titles, but I did like the nostalgic ambiance that the characters’ obsession with music gave the story. It certainly reminded me of my own music-crazed days as a teen.

The other thing that rang true about life in the early 80s was the complete lack of parental control and guidance. Bullying is common and almost accepted by teachers and parents. In this story, taking your lumps and keeping your mouth shut is a sign of strength, so all the kids go out of their way to hide all the atrocities that go on right under the teachers’ noses. Frankly, it shocked me a bit, and made me sick to my stomach, especially after the “event” that happens at the beginning of the story (an event that I won’t talk about because I consider it a spoiler). Not only does Andrew not tell what happened, he suffers a great deal with an injury that should have been tended to by a doctor.

Once Waggoner enters the picture, the story turns really weird. Now, I’m no stranger to “weird,” in fact I’ve read quite a few books that have been considered weird fiction and quite enjoyed them. But honestly, I didn’t understand half of what was going on in this story. The book is narrated by Andrew so everything is seen from his perspective. He considers Waggoner to be a separate entity, although no one else can see him. There are various references to “chalk” throughout the story. Andrew begins by telling us about the famous Cherill White Horse, a figure carved into a chalky hillside near his home. Louise, one of Andrew’s classmates, is chalk monitor at school, responsible for making sure all the chalk boards have enough chalk for the day. There’s also a couple of scenes where Andrew’s father is teaching him to play snooker (the British version of pool) and he describes using chalk on his cue stick. The theme of chalk obviously ties into the title of the book, but I had a hard time connecting the dots.

Once Waggoner embarks on his mission of vengeance, the story takes on a slasher film-like quality. Waggoner is going to make each of those five boys pay for what they did to him (Andrew), and it’s not going to be pretty. At this point I have to tell you there are some very disturbing scenes of violence and torture. I mean even for me, they were pretty bad.

I guess all this would have worked, if only there were some shred of emotion in any of the characters. Andrew’s narration is monotone and completely unemotional, and once things start, er, happening to the bullies, no one seems to care at all! It was all very strange. I have read that this is a very personal story for Paul Cornell, so perhaps this is one of those cases where I just can’t relate to what’s happening to these characters.

Oddly, I found Chalk very cinematic. I can almost imagine it as an indie film, with its dreamlike quality. Hell, it’s got a soundtrack already built in! It sort of reminded me of The Virgin Suicides, another story that revolves around music, not the story, per se, but the odd, disconnected feeling I had while watching it. But as far as a reading experience, it just didn’t work for me. I’d love to know if you’ve read this too, so I have someone to discuss it with. There are so many five-star reviews on Goodreads that I almost feel like I missed something. Talk to me!

Big thanks to the publisher for supplying a review copy.

Not an easy read - visceral and at times very confronting, an unflinching look at bullying and coming of age in the 80s (with many hat tips to the music of the time). Just the right amount of weirdness and creepiness to always keep the reader right on the edge. Probably not going to be everyone's cup of tea, but very much worth reading.

It’s 1983 and Andrew Waggoner is used to being bullied but one day Drake and his gang take things far too far. The violence they perpetrate on him cuts his very soul in half. It can’t be forgiven but Andrew has never been the kind of boy who could take revenge before.

Andrew lives in the eyeline of an ancient chalk horse, standing vigil over a site of ancient power. There he finds in himself an anger that divides him and could easily destroy those responsible.

This might seem like a Young Adult book from the blurb, and indeed it would suit readers of around 13 and older, but it stands it’s ground as a read for adults too.

It is brutal. I won’t tell you what happens to Andrew or what happens as a consequence but I winced and looked away a fair few times. Underlying that though is tenderness of family life, and the normalcy of caring about chart music and Dr Who. There’s also the tension and confusion that comes with having a crush on someone as well as the temptation to bully and harrass those weaker than you. Andrew joins in with bullying the few friends he has and starts a campaign of sexual harrassment against a girl that tells him he’s not even on her list of people she’d send a Valentines Card too. All behaviour that many of us would have experienced at school.

I think one of the things that’s so un-nerving about it is that it seems so autobiographical, Paul Cornell has written for Dr Who in the past so his love of it is well known, and the way the chart hits are woven through it becoming and integral thread of the story reinforces that feeling of familiarity.

The story is great, it’s well paced and things unfold with a feeling of inevitability that echoes that feeling of everything being out of control that plauges teenagehood.Having said that there are twists and there was a few times I worried about the author’s mental health!

The characters aren’t the most richly developed or nuanced that I’ve ever read but their main motivations are apparent enough and in keeping with who they seem to be, and I did care enough about them to read the story through to the end, very quickly in fact, I read it in a day!

4 Bites

NB I received a free copy of this book through NetGalley in return for an honest review. The BookEaters always write honest reviews

“Andrew Waggoner has a secret he will tell no one, except one person… himself…”

The advance whispers for “Chalk” were very pretty great and so I was delighted to find that this complex and manipulative tale of bullying set in a grim and drab version of Thatcher’s Britain really merited the hype. Everything about this very clever and challenging novel impressed me and I sped through it in a couple of very enjoyable evenings.

I think it’s important not to give too much away about the plot as it will spoil a few of the tasty twists which are boomeranged along the way. Set over the course of a school year, bullying is the constant theme which overshadows this 1982 set novel and much of it is pretty nasty and very realistic. You can feel the punches and kicks being delivered. Set in a small town in the Midlands where rural children are bussed to school, Andrew Waggoner is singled out and repeatedly bullied by five other boys. This is nasty, savage and very physical. Worse is to come though, after a school disco Andrew is physically disfigured after being tortured and this horrific episode leads the vulnerable teenager on a dark, dark path of revenge.

The novel then charts what happens to Andrew over the subsequent year. Written in the first person, narrated from some point in the future, Andrew is the classic unreliable narrator. You really cannot trust a word he says as he describes the crumbling school, his friends, girls, his squabbling parents and the weird episodes that evolve into near supernatural, almost hallucinogenic, episodes. What is real and what is not? It becomes increasingly difficult to tell….

There are brief, almost breath-taking spurts of violence which will make you wince, mainly because they are described through the matter-of-fact voice of Andrew. My favourite being the sports teacher losing an eye through a scissor kick in a football match that may, or may not have been intentional with the children staring at the spot where the eye dropped on the grass before being scooped up. The violence between the teenage boys is vividly described and one almost sees the playground as some sort of battleground.

As I grew up in rural Scotland and took the bus to school I can vouch for the accuracy of the bullying which takes place on the journey to and from school when some children are at their most vulnerable. And for Andrew Waggoner all this goes full circle as he nastily picks on a girl two years younger than him until he has almost beaten her spirit into the ground. The victim becomes the bully and it makes for uncomfortable reading.

The novel is set in Thatcher’s Britain, but it is music that sets the scene rather than politics. I remember this well from my own childhood: the importance of the No 1 single and the excitement of TV shows like Top of the Pops. Interestingly enough music helps explore identify in the novel, Andrew does not really know what he likes and the bullies like punkier music such as The Jam and The Stiff Little Fingers. However, there is a girl he is attracted to, who loves her chart music and he just does not know what to say to her. So this is all examined through very realistic teen angst and the inability to communicate.

Of course behind all of this Andrew Wagghorn has a dark secret, something he can tell no one and via this the terrific novel goes full circle. So I haven’t said much about horror in this review, however, it’s always present on a subliminal level as Andrew embarks on his own journey into increasing darkness.

Along the way there are many terrific touches. It’s a private school, but even though it seems pretty grotty Andrew’s parents struggle to pay the fees and annually hope their son will win a prize which will see his fees paid for the following year, he never does, and this just adds to his feeling of uselessness and failure. The teachers and headmaster are vividly drawn through the eyes of this very troubled teenage boy and the school itself becomes alive and some of the set pieces with the bullies are stunningly vicious. Are they fourteen year olds or monsters?

This was a terrific, challenging and very original novel which will keep you both gripped and guessing until the last page. And what a brilliantly understated last page it has. Bullying is rife in high schools and these days we hear much about the impact of social media bullying, but what happened here in 1982 was much, much worse. Scars which Paul Cornell has built a top notch psychological horror novel around. Highly recommended.

This was one of those rare books that stopped me in my tracks. At times not an easy read, I felt it spoke to me, making the story involving, in places painful but above all, personal.

I should explain that at school in the late 70s/ early 80s I was bullied quite a bit, I was a bit swotty and not a mixer so with a few pages I identified strongly with Andrew Waggoner. He's an ordinary boy for the time: into Doctor Who, not sporty, a bit shy, trying to avoid the school bullies, with mixed success.

Then one evening - something happens. I was frankly gobsmacked by the place that Cornell goes to. I won't give away what it is but it's no exaggeration to say nothing will be the same again for Andrew. The book really begins at this point and describes what happens over the next year.

It's a taut, claustrophobic story that drops hints at a haunted landscape, at reservoirs of power and a deep, pent-up urge for revenge, denied over centuries until fertilised by blood, rage and fear. Andrew seem to become the vessel for that revenge which promises to pay his enemies back for what they did. The chosen tool is a second Andrew - always referred to simply as "Waggoner" - a creature who, or which, has an epiphany at the old hillfort and sets in motion a plan...

We're never quite sure - nor meant to be - whether Waggoner is "real" (and some kind of supernatural presence) or a projection of Andrew's rage. Others perceive them as one yet Waggoner seems to have motivations and a confidence that are very distinct form Andrew's. Indeed the struggle between them animates much of the story as, in that year, friendships are made and broken, pretended to and refused: as Andrew, very tentatively, becomes close to a girl: but above all as the chalk patterns of vengeance spiral round and begin to grip the school.

I loved - if you can use the word for such a dark book - the way Cornell blends the realities in this story. There is the world of the almost-adults in the school. Awful acts of bullying take place only a hairsbreadth away from adults who surely must know about them, surely ought to intervene. Yet it's as if everyone has fallen into another kingdom with different rules. In a sense that seems no more unlikely than an ancient tribe living behind a thin veil in a real hillfort, or a twin created for a dark and secret purpose. Then there's the curious world of the adults, with their own problems, of money, ageing and memories. And the two run in parallel, rarely intersecting. I wonder whether the need, the desire to read (and to write) fantasy taps into this double universes? We all know in our bones that there isn't one world but many, and exploring that through fantasy is less painful than facing it directly?

But it's not just Cornell's themes that resonated with me in this book. More than in anything else by him that I've read, he describes the world as I see (saw) it. The white line (you'll know it when you get to it!). The whole, arcane, teenage world of things that you aren't allowed to like and things that you must - Andrew anxiously runs through the current pop hits, desperate not to betray himself by liking, even by knowing about, the wrong things. Or, forced to pass an initiation test, he fails on banal questions about football managers. In other places he rages about not following sport or music because it's what the other kids are into. In a third rate private school out on the chalk of Wiltshire, deviance is severely punished by the other kids.

But what if you could punish them? The I recognised this thirst for revenge too - and part of me cheered Waggoner on as he delivers it, even as a greater unease grew. It seems more and more likely there will be collateral damage, that innocents will the drawn in...

I'd warn the reader that you may find - well I found - bits of this book difficult. There were times I had to put it down and breathe calmly - but I could never put it down for long. It is, simply, the best thing of Cornell's I've ever read. Buy it, read it.

I don't quite know how to rate this, because it's not much my thing. It's a bit too close to horror, it's so grim, and the teenage boy fixation with sex was, well, rather beyond my experience or anything I'm interested in. Bullying I know well, and Cornell captures it wonderfully -- but I can't say beautifully, because who could call that beautiful? The magic is weird and wondrous and I do enjoy the way it's tied in with history and the landscape.

I was less interested or convinced by Angie's pop music magic; it felt very thin indeed, almost just a way to give her more of a role in the story without it feeling organic. But the main character's ambivalence to her, the people around him, the great big revenge that's happened because he wanted it -- that feels real.

I can't say I enjoyed this, and I can't say I'd read it again, but nor would I urge someone not to read it. It's definitely powerful, and I had to read to the end, even though I found aspects of it distasteful (I suspect I was intended to).

[Review link live from 21st March 2017.]

A pretty dark, sad story about bullying that reaches a level of violence that breaks Andrew Waggoner, physically and mentally. There are ancient powers and pop music that take us through the journey with Andrew as he slogs through the misery of the aftermath.

Andrew has spent most of his school years with a small group of "loser" friends, and staying under the radar of the popular jocks so as to avoid their constant taunting and humiliation towards other classmates. When Drake and his crew force Andrew into the woods, it ends up going way beyond jeers and "roughhousing".

The book explores so many angles; bullying, reactions of everyone - from teachers, parents, other students, and the victim, retribution, survival, cycle of abuse/violence, and mental illness. Andrew seeks vengeance and survival through his darker self. The sad truth of what lies beneath the actions and thoughts of the characters in this book is a mirror of what most of society is like.
I received an ARC from NetGalley in exchange for my opinion.

Review: CHALK by Paul Cornell

Paul Cornell became one of my favorite authors with his SHADOW POLICE series. His newest novel, CHALK, however, is completely different, set on the chalk downs of Wiltshire rather than in esoteric London. I found it an intriguing but disturbing read, a novel which is up front about bullying violence and its repercussions. It is also a story illuminating the dangers of awakening history. On one level, it could be viewed as a chronicle of mental disorder stimulated by traumatic violence [and certainly there are contemporary examples of that]. Beyond that view is a very intense paranormal framework, one which invokes entities, prehistory, and events of Roman Britain. Those who watched for Roman invasion still watch on. Whichever viewpoint one chooses to elicit the novel's themes, this story will shake up one's own received world view and refuse to be forgotten.