Big Shadow
by Marta Balcewicz
Book*hug Press, 2023
Review by Kristina Rothstein
The Big Shadow is coming. Judy has just finished high school and is on the brink of university, adulthood, and a whole new life. She is also tasked with watching the sky for signs of the Big Shadow: a presence or absence that might take any form and mean anything. Her cousin Christopher’s best friend Alex is a believer in this mysterious, amorphous phenomenon, but all he knows is that it is coming for them and it will bring a big change. He is the boss of their gang of three, but Judy is tired of being told what to do. The three teens typically hang out in the “countrystead,” the large out-of-town home of Alex’s mother but soon after the novel opens, Judy decides to sneak away in the middle of the night. She is discovered by Christopher, who tails her in a car as she walks down a freeway ramp, then drives her home to her mother’s apartment. There is always a subtle sense of surveillance and control coming from Alex, though it is not clear why he has a hold over Christopher. The swelter of a summer heat wave permeates the opening of the story, as Judy wanders and reminisces about her one almost-boyfriend, who has recently moved to New York, her dream destination.
Set in the late 1990s, this debut novel from Toronto author Marta Balcewicsz captures a sense of late slacker aesthetic, with a languid cadence that propels the story. It is the clarity and confidence of the prose and leisurely pacing that drive the narrative, rather than the plot. Equally intriguing is the weird atmosphere, where almost supernatural occurrences remain unexplained, lurking on the margins. Since the form of the Big Shadow is uncertain, Judy is often swayed by potential signs, such as a random short story which is about Yoko Ono taking vaporous shape, and a hyper-awareness of the sound of ringing telephones, even when she knows there is no sound. At this point, she is looking for direction and meaning in anything. Judy goes her own way, but she is still tied to Christopher and Alex, whose slightly deranged mission expands to clearing the jungle of trees that have grown in Alex’s unused swimming pool, using a spotlight to work at night and trying to baptize Judy in the stagnant rainwater at the bottom of the pool.
The location of the majority of the story is anonymous, but it is close enough to New York that a visiting professor might commute between the two cities, and is big enough to have a university. While walking through the university campus, Judy takes shelter from a thunderstorm and meets Maurice Blunt, a one-time luminary of the New York punk scene, a member of a band called the Sateelites, and a middling poet. He is attracted to her lackadaisical indifference, and the spectacle of the heat breaking into a torrential downpour in the moment that they meet seems like a portent of something significant. She starts showing up at his summer term poetry class, despite the fact that she is not registered. By playing it cool, she retains his interest, and he is soon pitting the two of them against the world, telling her that no one else gets them. He constantly tells her how cool she is, and when he casually invites her to visit New York City, she finds a way to make this a reality. Soon she is spending weekends in New York, electrified but also disappointed by Maurice’s idea of a good time. Judy’s summer is a struggle to discover how to actually kickstart her life’s journey. Wanting to be part of something is what drives her fantasy of being accepted in Maurice’s world, even when she is often embarrassed or repulsed by it. What she is on the brink of is hazy, even to her, and her vague, uncertain idea about the future feels so authentic.
The experience of being noticed by a famous older man is not glamourized, nor is Judy described as a great beauty (perhaps because of the first-person narration), a cliché of coming-of-age stories about bright and curious young women. The setting is only the near past, not exactly a simpler or more innocent time, and Judy is lucky to escape basically unscathed, unlike many other naive girls. Big Shadow considers the complicated consequences of using one’s power to get noticed, while not genuinely wanting the attention. Judy is intelligent and reserved, qualities which make her attractive to Maurice, but her lack of experience also makes her a target for manipulation. She has little social expertise, but with Maurice, she instinctively knows how to maintain an enigmatic persona that will tempt him into her life. What Balcewicz balances so delicately is what Maurice and Judy want from each other. He is not portrayed as a dangerous predator, but his interest certainly has a creepy sexual component, which Judy does not welcome, but does not know how to discourage. The sexual politics are expressed in hints and glimpses, as they would appear to Judy, who is not sophisticated or worldly. She imagines him vaguely as a friend and mentor in a future when, “the only palpable energy between us would be the energy generated by our shared misanthropy, our love of Lou [Reed], and our love of each other even, but not the kind that most men want.” It seems likely that Maurice wants what “most men want,” but Judy’s naivete is so convincing that we almost believe her. Judy observes everything with a combination of irony and earnestness, scrutinizing her own actions but rarely understanding them, and able to believe contradictory truths.
The experience is eye-opening for Judy, and while New York does not lose its appeal, it does become more complicated in her imagination. What her adventures with Maurice are not, however, is fun. What she really wants is something she isn’t capable of yet: navigating the city on her own terms, with her own sense of purpose. She doesn’t love being Maurice’s sidekick, and even meeting his famous friends leaves her cold. She does not even really like the attention or the validation. On the other hand, when he disappears for hours or days at a time, she does not know how to fill that time. The promise of fun and self-knowledge actually lies with her peers, specifically a girl from her poetry class, whom she disparagingly dismissed as “Bettie Page,” when they first met. Jennifer and her friend Ricky are some of the only kind people in the book, realists who are working towards their own ideals without manipulating anyone along the way. They actually like Judy and are concerned for her safety. They can see that she is a little lost, but they see her potential. It is thoughtful and supportive friends like them who will help her become a cool and interesting adult, not creeps like Maurice.
By the end of the summer, Judy can see that everything that happens in life can be interpreted as the Big Shadow, if you look at it the right way.
Kristina Rothstein is a writer and editor in Vancouver. She is the creator of the podcast In Search of Lost Venues and runs a micropress called Smart Cookie Publishing.