Heaven Eyes - David Almond

Heaven Eyes is a mystifying story I adored the first read through, and only fell further for on my second, third, and fourth reads, though even now I am not sure why. The three main characters are January Carr, Erin Law, and Mouse Gullane, the three of them orphans. January was abandoned at the hospital he was born at, named after a combination of his hospital and the month he was born. Mouse was abandoned as well, his mother having died before his father disappeared. He is named after the pet he keeps in his pocket, named Squeak. They are called 'damaged' children and live in an orphanage called Whitegates. First it tells of the troubled souls of each child, how January imagines his mother was young and desperate, unable to care for him which lead to his abandonment. It tells of Mouse with his poorly scrawled tattoo that reads 'please look after me' that his father printed on his arm. Each child insists they must have been loved before they were cast away, and the world in turn labels them as broken beyond repair.

The story departs from interlude and into the heart of the tale when the three friends decide to run away. Running away is something most of the children at Whitegates have done, but few ever leave for more than a week. Their adventure is different, though, as they find themselves in a completely different world called the Black Middens, where the meet a little girl named Heaven Eyes. She speaks a strange half-speech with an angel's voice and has webbed fingers. The world suddenly diverges from the cold realism of Whitegates to a near fantasy setting in the old factory Heaven Eyes and Grandpa live in. Deep symbolism it stitched into the very fabric of the story, and it is left up to the reader to see it.

This story invokes deep feeling in the reader, and though it is written in language meant to portray the view of a child, it is scripted very eloquently. It is a story that flows by quickly, and well worth the read.

Weishan Chin

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