willemite

The Channel Islands off the California coast, near Ventura, are home to many species of flora and fauna that are either rare or nonexistent elsewhere. Serial invasion by intent or accident having placed many of these species at risk of extinction, the National Park Service wants to restore natural biota to the islands. In order to accomplish this goal, it will be necessary to remove the exotics. In this case that means rats and wild pigs. So what is an ecologist to do? It may be a laudable goal to restore the islands to their natural state, but if the only way of accomplishing this end means having to slaughter hundreds, thousands of unwanted rats and pigs, is that an acceptable cost? Preservation, extermination, invasion, resistance, doing the right thing, defining what that right thing is, appreciating the bio diversity of some of the Channel islands and surviving the depredations of human interactions all feature large in TC Boyle’s latest novel When the Killing’s Done.

Alma Boyd Takesue is the NPS official in charge of the project. She is a dedicated ecologist, with a big-picture view and has been making the rounds speaking wherever and whenever she can to explain and promote the NPS program. Her nemesis is Dave LaJoy, wealthy from the success of a chain of stores, and possessed of lots and lots of free time. He believes that the killing of animals, whatever the higher purpose, is wrong. LaJoy dogs Alma at her speaking engagements, and plans more direct actions to see that her island efforts fail. Theirs is the central conflict in the story.

Boyle takes us back in time to see the islands in various stages, with water transportation coming in for rough seas as a way of viewing history. The connection between invasions is nowhere clearer than in the case of the first shipwreck resident Boyle offers. Beverly Boyd drags herself from a potential aqueous end onto Anacapa after her ship is destroyed in a storm. When Boyle gets around to telling of an earlier wreck, one that brought the four-footed, bedraggled invader, Rattus rattus, one cannot but think of Bev. There is also overt mention that some of the greatest damage had been done to native life by species introduced by people, species like sheep and pigs. And there are more shipwrecks to come, but I won't spoil by telling when or how.

Parallel to telling the tale of the islands is the history of two main matrilineal families. We get a significant look at the personal history of the Boyds, from the time when pregnant Bev loses both her husband and brother-in-law in a stormy sea. Next comes her daughter, Katherine, Kat, married to a man her mother does not accept, who has keeping-her-husband-alive troubles of her own. And finally Kat’s daughter, Alma, who keeps the traditional relationship losing streak going. Alongside this we see the somewhat smaller timeline of Rita Reed. An erstwhile musician, she leaves her abusive husband, daughter in tow, to take a job cooking for sheep-farmers on Santa Cruz. As an adult, her daughter, Anise, takes on with the decidedly human-hostile LaJoy. One wonders here if Boyle is trying to rid the place of fathers as well as rats. Are any fathers capable of both raising children and surviving? I am not familiar enough with Boyle’s oeuvre to know if this is thematically persistent in his novels, but it certainly stood out for me here. Although Boyle says that his were good parents, one must wonder if there is something about their relationship that has crept into his view of the durability of marriage. His parents did suffer from substance issues. Maybe that colored his view.

The ironically named Dave LaJoy is a cartoon. I am not certain this was Boyle’s full intent. He does give LaJoy some humanity on occasion. The guy really does have issues with people killing animals. But he is such an over-the-top jerk that it is very difficult to see past his anger management (does not take his Xanax) issues, and general misanthropy to gain much sympathy for his outlook. Attempts to humanize him pall in comparison to the very vivid images presenting him as an arrogant, irresponsible, socially challenged bully. Boyle tries to offer a smaller image of misguided eco-friendlies. A group of uneducated, if well-meaning sorts are shown trying to encourage a baby seal back into the water when it had been out of the water on purpose, trying to get some sun. While Boyle does not overtly take sides in the debate presented, it is pretty clear that he sided with folks who have their science right.

There are swimmers in the water one might hook if trawling for a bit of foreboding. A flying fish that zooms into one boat presages the entrance of the entire sea. A fisherman who had netted a young Great White, when asked where the larger ones reside, says "off the islands." This struck me as the equivalent, in scary movies, of the ingénue insisting on looking in the forbidden room, or the child turning back towards the monster to retrieve her teddy bear. Would you feel comforted were you about to sail into such waters? Dave LaJoy, having suffered some setbacks, flirts with a mysterious blonde just before heading out on a dangerous mission. Could she have been a siren?

Boyle wades a bit into fantasy waters. Anacapa Island is infested with rats. Their voracious, omnivorous appetite has made life particularly difficult for truly native fauna. But are the rats on the island really people who had been changed, a la Circe? A fairy tale offers that suggestion and one might presume that Boyle fishes these waters as a way of giving us second thoughts about the National Park Service plan to remove the species from the island with extreme prejudice. Although not considered candidates for removal, ravens, which are presented in quite dark terms, are offered a bit of humanity.

Francisco said they were the souls of Indians, las almas de los Indios, come back from the dead to plague the white men who displaced them

A woman left by Padres in the 1830s was reputed to have two ravens for pets.

Will the islands be restored? Will invasive species be removed? Will any fathers survive or stick around to raise their children?

I liked the book. It told an interesting story, and offered a wealth of information that was news to me about the Channels. But I was not blown away. I did not get that tingle one gets on putting a top-notch book down, that you can’t wait to pick it up and see where it is going next. Still, that said, it is a worthwhile read.

I thought the title overstated a bit. There is plenty of killing, to be sure, but killing implies intent and not all the deaths here are intentional, unless, I suppose, one considers nature and/or fate to be killers.

T.C. Boyle was raised in a working class environment in northern Westchester county. He found his way to California, like so many other invasive species, and has settled in quite nicely. It is not known whether he displaced any natives. Given the quality of the work he produces, this seems like an instance in which it is probably best to just leave the newcomer alone.

It would be great if GR allowed half stars, as I would have liked to move this up to 3.5.