Arvin’s latest is terrific

By Nick Arvin (Europa Editions)

You have to love a book that starts like this: A cow falls through the roof of a house, landing on Mother. She dies, but her voice lives on. Mother tells her young son, Henry Phipps, that she wants to be buried at sea, surrounded by her family. Henry determines to oblige her.

That is no easy request to fill, however. Father is in debtors’ prison, and brother Franklin has gone off to fight the war. So Henry loads Mother into a pickle barrel and sets off by himself. Therein lies a terse, quirky adventure.

“Mad Boy” is the third work of fiction by acclaimed Denver author Nick Arvin. An earlier work, “Articles of War,” was chosen for Denver’s One Book, One Denver reading program. “Mad Boy is a finely honed literary achievement, beautifully written and as clever as it is memorable.

Despite its sparseness, “Mad Boy” is a complicated tale filled with a cast of a dozen characters. As he starts off pushing Mother seaward in the barrel, Henry runs smack into the war of 1812. He’s been told by a run-away slave that Franklin is dead, shot for desertion. Henry is confused. Franklin is such an honorable man that he enlisted for the bonus money, to pay off Father’s debts. Instead, Father gambled it away.

Meanwhile, poor Mother is left to decompose in the pickle barrel. To Mother’s consternation, Henry parks her near the battlefield. She jabbers away, telling Henry he must get her to sea. But Henry has other challenges.

Franklin, it turns out, is not dead at all. Henry encounters him on the battlefield. He also encounters Franklin’s girlfriend, Mary, just as she gives birth to Franklin’s child. Mary’s father, Suthers, is ready to whisk away the baby, so Henry helps Mary escape. The Suthers and Phipps families have been entwined for generations. The original Phipps built a successful plantation, but his progeny lost it to Suthers through gambling and laziness. For reasons Henry doesn’t know, Suthers takes a special interest in him.

Suthers is only one of several villains. Another is the Redcoat turncoat Morley. Henry gets entangled with him while both are trying to loot a house. Henry is no more successful at looting than he is at lying. Nonetheless, Morley suggests they team up, and the two go off in a search for riches. After all, Henry has to pay off Father’s debts so the man can be released to attend Mother’s burial. Meanwhile, Mother molders away.

All this happens at the beginning of the book. There are gripping battlefield scenes and descriptions of poverty and greed, along with bags of purloined gold coins and the bombardment of Fort Mchenry, while somebody is writing a poem that will become the national anthem.

“Mad Boy” is a great success, a mini-epic in just 238 pages.

Sandra Dallas is a Denver author.