A Boy Is Not A Ghost by Edeet Ravel

In this sequel to A Boy Is Not A Bird, the saga of Natt Silver continues. Natt and his mother have been deported from their home in Zastavna to Siberia. It is the summer of 1941 and twelve-year-old Natt and his mother have been on a train for six weeks and two days. They finally arrive in Novosibirsk, Siberia, a city of four hundred thousand people where they are given soft bread, a steam bath, and their clothes are disinfected. Natt along with the other deportees is taken to a school with a fenced in schoolyard. On his fourth day in the schoolyard, Natt meets a boy and a girl who live in Novosibirsk, near the fence. The girl is Olga who who has been studying ballet and her brother Peter who wants to be a chemist. Olga tells Natt that her mother is a translator for the government. Natt and Olga form a connection over their mutual love of ballet and Beethoven and at Natt's request, she gives him her address..

Later that night, Natt helps a young mother named Felicia escape into the village with her baby. She has a distant cousin who has offered to help her, giving her a chance for her baby to survive. In exchange for this, Natt comes into possession of emerald earrings. Their group now consists of Natt and his mother, Elias and Cecilia and little Shainie and Irena, the young school teacher who joined the deportees in the hope of finding her mother.'

After a few days in Novosibirsk, their group along with most of the other deportees are shipped on three enormous barges north on the Ob River. A week into their trip, they detour to Tomsk and then continue up the Ob where every day a small group of "settlers" are let off. Natt and his mother are taken off the barge at Porotnikov where they are told at the Community House that they've been exiled for twenty years. There they manage to find lodging in a third of the kitchen of a house owned by a couple and their six or seven children.

Natt's Mama and Irena are forced to dig out tree stumps for eleven hours a day. Natt finds himself constantly hungry. But things get even worse when his mother is tricked into stealing a few potatoes and is arrested. His mother is taken to the jail in Bakchar. Irena manages to get a clerk job in Bakchar and she and Natt quickly pack to hitch a ride with a farmer. Irena had promised Natt's mother she would look after him. They are able to rent a whole room to themselves that has a stove, a bed, cot, table and two stools in Bakchar.

The next day Natt meets a girl while on a walk at the beach. She speaks Romanian and offers him some soft cheese. He learns her name is Gabriella and she is only three months away from being twelve. Irena returns that night with a bag full of food. She tells Natt that she attended his mother's trial and that she's been sentenced to a year in jail in Tomsk.

But barely three weeks into his stay in Bakchar, Natt is faced with more changes. He learns that Irena who is Polish, is now free to go wherever she wants, and she plans to move to Moscow in the hopes of eventually reuniting with her parents. Natt is faced with the difficult decision of whether he should leave with Irena and be thousands of  kilometers from his mother or stay and be on his own in a city where he knows no one. The choice he ultimately makes nearly costs him his life but in the end, the prediction of the fortune teller comes to pass.

Discussion

As Ravel has previously indicated, the events in her first novel, A Boy Is Not A Bird and in this sequel, A Boy Is Not A Ghost  are based on the real life experiences of her fifth-grade teacher, Nahum Halpern. Although some of the characters in these novels are fictional, Nahum really did experience many of the events Ravel describes in her books. Some of the real life events include Natt's travel on the barge up the Ob River, his winter in Porotnikova, living with the Mindrus, the sleigh ride and his serious illness that forced him into hospital. Also real are the people who helped Natt survive his ordeal in Siberia, including Yuri, Sima Israelovna, and the two NKVD officers. 

In A Boy Is Not A Ghost, Natt becomes so traumatized by the repeated hardships and sense of loss that the only way he can survive is, as he puts it, to become a ghost. Becoming invisible, suppressing his feelings and withdrawing into himself offer him a way to cope with what he is experiencing. After surviving a brutal train ride into the heart of Siberia and experiencing every deprivation, Natt is unprepared to cope with the arrest of his mother. When his mother is jailed and he and Irena move to Bakchar to be near her, Natt states, "I stare at the passing trees in a daze. I'm starting to feel like a ghostly spirit, drifting from place to place. Every day I'm becoming more invisible and less solid. Solid kids have homes. Imaginary kids have imaginary homes." 

Just as things settle, Natt learns he will be losing Irena. As she struggles to find someone to take Natt in, he begins to feel numb. It isn't until he recovers from his illness at the Mindru's after being given the "water cure" for his fever that Natt begins to feel again. He notes that "It seems the water cure has woken up my emotions. I begin to cry and I don't even try to stop." He is comforted by Gabi who tells him they love him and that he has friends who love him.

Although Natt is cared for by the Mindrus and loses the feeling that he is a ghost,  when he receives a letter from his mother written in code, telling him that she and Natt's father are planning their escape from Siberia, he believes he must return to being a ghost again. "I also have to practice not calling attention to myself, so that when I do slip away, no one will notice, like Felicia when she stepped into the dark. I have to practice being a ghost again."

Being a ghost though is conflicting for Natt. After attending Mr. Goldman's clandestine Hanukkah party, Natt remembers past celebrations but this has mixed blessings. "I decide that remembering is both the best thing and the worst thing, but that you have to remember. If you don't remember, you really are a ghost." When Natt obtains his travel pass to Tomsk he believes he must be like a warplane that flies very low to avoid being detected by radar. "That's what I have to do. Fly low. I need to be very boring, very small, nearly invisible." After Natt and his mother finally arrive in Moscow, he begins to feel that he has become a nobody, a ghost. He is humiliated and ashamed of how he and his mother look. "All this time, trying to be invisible, trying to be a nobody -- I suddenly feel as if I really have turned into a nobody...What if I'm not just a nobody, but a disgusting, stinky nobody."

Ultimately it is Olga and Peter and their father Edward who welcome them into their home, and who begin Natt on the path towards reclaiming his identity. Olga tells him she loves him because he's interesting and kind and not bitter about all the hardships he's endured. To Natt's surprise, he discovers he is not a ghost after all.

It's difficult to comprehend the hardships people in Eastern Europe endured under both Nazi and Soviet occupation, especially under Stalin. A Boy Is Not A Ghost succeeds in portraying to readers these unimaginable hardships in a way that is realistic but also with a touch of humour for so serious a topic. It's important that experiences like those of Nahum Halpern not be forgotten because they help us understand how important it is to preserve the freedoms we often take for granted in Canada.

Ravel has included a map showing the locale of the story, an Author's Note and a detailed Historical Background that touches on Russia during the rule of the Czars, World War II, Stalin and the post war period. Another excellent novel by Canadian author Edeet Ravel.

Book Details:

A Boy Is Not A Ghost by Edeet Ravel
Toronto: Groundwood Books, House of Anansi Press   2021
239 pp.

A Boy Is Not A Bird by Edeet Ravel

It is the summer of 1940 and Nathan (Natt) Silver and his best friend Max Zwecker are playing a game called Life and Death on the High Seas when Max's mother tells Natt he has to go home. Natt lives in Zastavna, with his mother, his father who runs a grain business and their housemaid, Lana. The village has a large Ukrainian population and is only a few hours from Czernowitz, the largest city in Burkovina. Natt speaks many languages including German, Ukrainian, Romanian, Hebrew and Yiddish.

When Natt arrives home, he is surprised to find a large number of people crammed into his parents' bedroom listening to the radio. It is the BBC broadcasting in German. Among the "guests" listening, is their lawyer Bruno Jacobson, whom Natt and Max have nicknamed Bruno the Bald, the dentist Dr. Schiff whose daughter Lucy visits often and Natt's violin teacher, Mr. Drabik and his wife.

After their guests leave, Natt's father explains that in the past year Hitler signed a pact with Stalin meaning that Russia is now taking over this part of the country. The hated Iron Guard are leaving and Natt will be learning Russian with new teachers.

Natt's family could have been safe from all of this, had they followed through on their plan to leave five years ago. At that time his parents were going to move to Montreal, Canada where relatives lived, but at the last minute his mother changed her mind.

Several days later, Natt's  parents tell him they are burying a box of gold coins in their backyard. This seems very strange to Natt. The Russians arrive, singing songs and telling the people that their friend, Stalin will look after them. 

Changes happen at school as well. Gone is Mrs. Bubu, the teacher everyone doesn't like. Instead their new teacher is Comrade Minsky, who used to be a professor at a famous Moscow university. There is also Comrade Martha who hands out candy canes and introduces the class to Comrade Stalin on the poster on the wall. She tells Natt, Max and the other students their goal is to become Pioneers.

Natt's life begins to unravel quickly after the arrival of the Russians. They lose their home, which is taken over by the Russians to be used as a bank, and have to move into the apartment attached to their home. The men who helped Natt's father in his grain business leave. Hebrew school is no longer allowed, and churches are being closed down.

Then Natt wakes up unexpectedly at his Aunt Dora's home one night. At his insistence, he is taken home where he learns that his father has been arrested. In a strange event, Natt and another student at school, receive a prize for showing outstanding revolutionary spirit. The prize is a baby book for three year olds written by famous author Daniil Kharms, a revelation that causes Comrade Minsky to weep.

Meanwhile Natt's father continues to be held in jail, despite his mother's numerous packages of food in an attempt to bribe the NKVD, the Russian secret police. As the weeks go by, Natt is shunted from one relative to the next, eventually ending up at the farm of Mr. and Mrs. Shapiro. Before Natt's twelfth birthday, he and his mother are allowed to walk by the prison to see his father at the window. But Natt, conflicted over the communist indoctrination he's receiving at school and his father in prison, refuses to look at him. This causes him much regret afterwards.

On his twelfth birthday, Natt learns that his father has been sentenced to five years in jail. But he later learns the truth from his friend Lucy who tells him that his father is being sent to work in the gold mines in Magadan, Siberia, more than eleven thousand kilometers from home. He will be in a new kind of prison called a gulag run by the NKVD.

Devastated, Natt seeks out his friend Matt who tells him to open his eyes to what is going on around him and to trust only a very few people including his parents. Then his mother goes into hiding, something Natt only learns about when he is arrested. In the filthy prison, without food or water, Natt is questioned and terrorized by the police until his mother shows up. At this point things get much worse. He learns that they will have to pack and leave for Siberia. When he and his mother arrive at the train station they are stunned to see that hundreds of others are also there. They are being deported to Siberia. It is the beginning of a terrible journey which will require Natt to be the courageous hero that his father has encouraged him to be.

Discussion

A Boy Is Not a Bird is a book based on the life experiences of Nahum Halpern, who taught the author during her childhood. Nahum was exiled to Siberia along with his family in 1940. Although based on the events in Nahum's life, the characters and conversations are entirely fictional creations of the author. The story is told from the point of view of Natt Silver, a young boy who is beginning to grow up but whose parents, in particular his mother, attempt to protect him from the harsh realities of war. 

Natt's mother spends much of her time pretending that everything is normal, as things go from bad to worse. Natt knows from the beginning that his mother is not telling him the truth. When she tells him about the Hebrew school and the churches closing, she forces herself to laugh. But Natt finds this unsettling. "It's a bit spooky. That type of fake laugh, especially when it's your mother who's putting on an act."

Natt's mother tells him his telescope is in safe keeping, yet he overhears her telling Aunt Dora and Uncle Isaac it has been sold. Natt believes that after the war, he will get everything back. When Natt's father is sentenced to five years in jail, his mother doesn't tell him what has really happened, only that he's likely safer in prison than in the army. But from his friend Lucy, he learns that his father has been sentenced to hard labour in the gulag. 

Natt begins to realize that his mother's actions are a façade. When his father is sentenced to the gulag, Natt's mother remarks that he will likely be safer in prison than in the army. When they drive by their house on the way to the train station to be deported, she tells Natt they are lucky to have the chance to say goodbye to their home. As they are being deported, his mother's words are in stark contrast to what Natt feels and he realizes,  "Mama is not only putting on an act for the people in charge. She's also putting on an act for me. She doesn't want me to be scared, so she's pretending that everything is fine and dandy...So she's pretending and I'm pretending. Neither of us can say what we really feel about the old house....Neither of us can say or show what we feel about Papa being sent to Siberia and the two of us following him -- and not even to the same place, as far as we know."

Natt's parents while protecting him, try to prepare him for the horrors of war in a more general way. His parents have different advice for him. The novel takes its title from a story that Natt is told by his mother about how war has a transient effect. "When two countries are fighting...there can be a lot of confusion. You can't predict from one day to the next what will happen." She tells him that "...war is like a dog barking at a flock of birds who are sitting quietly on a haystack. The birds fly away, but then when the war ends, they come back to where they were."  In other words, the effects of war are transient, and some day things return to the way they once were.

His father however, advises Natt to have courage and be a hero. "War is when you get a chance to be a hero. Because every day that you get through it, you've done something heroic." When Natt asks what this means his father responds, "Get through whatever comes your way...And you Natt...are definitely hero material. No matter what, you will always be courageous, keeping in mind that the birds as Mama says, will find their way back after the war." However, a boy is not a bird, and it's not always possible to be courageous and to find one's way.

While this sounds romantic, by the time Natt is almost in Siberia, he knows differently. "I think a lot these days about what Papa said. In wartime, just getting through the day makes you a hero. But I don't feel like a hero. I think it's the opposite really. War makes you feel smaller and smaller. You keep shrinking, like Alice in Wonderland, until you're so small you're practically invisible. A person that tiny can't be a hero." But what Natt has experienced, how he has already endured many weeks of suffering and deprivation, demonstrate that he is very much a hero.

Ravel captures the horror of the deportation by train into Siberia that millions experienced. The story is set in Zastavna but doesn't identify exactly where this is. Zastavna was part of Romania in 1940 but is now part of Ukraine. There is also mention of the Iron Guard and how Natt and everyone in Zastavna feared them. The Iron Guard was a fascist movement that sided with Germany. In 1940, Romania lost much of its territory to the Soviets, including the area around Burkovina, where Natt's village is located.

A Boy Is Not A Bird is the first book in a planned trilogy. Ravel includes an Author's Note which explains his inspiration for the novel, as well as a map and a Historical Note.

Book Details:

A Boy Is Not A Bird by Edeet Ravel
Toronto: Groundwood Books   2019
229 pp.