Reading Guide for In Darkness by Nick Lake
WINNER OF THE 2013 MICHAEL L. PRINTZ AWARD
Praise for In Darkness
★ ‚A dark journey well worth taking—engrossing, disturbing,
illuminating.‛
—Kirkus Reviews, starred review
★ ‚A startling . . . feat of literary imagination.‛
—Publishers Weekly, starred review
★‚A striking cast of characters . . . and the reality and
immediacy of Haiti’s precarious existence will captivate
secondary readers.‛
—School Library Journal, starred review
‚Remarkable . . . Mr. Lake’s elegant, restrained prose and distinct
characters
will reward adults and older teenagers.‛ —Wall Street Journal
‚Gripping.‛ —New York Times
978-1-59990-743-7
Hardcover $17.99
In Brief
Shorty, an unforgettable fifteen-year-old protagonist, trapped in the ruins of a hospital after the Haitian
earthquake of 2010, tells the story of how he became a slum-land gangster. His narrative is intercut with
another astonishing first-person tale, that of Toussaint l’Ouverture, the eighteenth-century slave who led
Haiti to freedom from the French. The two are connected in deep and mysterious ways, but there is no
guarantee that either story will end well . . .
In Detail
Shorty is trapped in suffocating rubble, surrounded by bent and broken bodies, starved and desperately
thirsty. Partly to keep himself sane, he tells his story, beginning with how he was delivered, one of twins,
by Prime Minister Aristide himself. How he always shared his soul with his twin, Marguerite. How his
father was brutally murdered in front of his eyes and his sister dragged away. How he gained the
protection of the rival gang and, partly because his own origins were fêted, was taken under the wing of
Dread Wilmè, the most powerful gangster in Site Solèy. How Dread saved him when part of the gang was
destroyed and handed him a stone believed to contain an ancestor’s spirit. How Shorty seem blessed
thereafter. How he spent years waging gang warfare so that he might finally be reunited with his sister. It
is a frequently shocking story, of shattering circumstances and the moral equivocations of gang life. And,
given the age of some of the gang members, it is a story of innocence defiled.
Shorty’s narrative is intertwined with that of Toussaint l’Ouverture, a favored slave whose mind is
opened by his angrier fellows, who tells of how he stops accepting the evils of slavery and, after a vodou
ceremony he doesn’t think he believes in, assumes leadership of the slave revolution. Toussaint struggles
to keep the revolution humane, to make it as free of revenge as possible, when his enemies, both French
and English, cannot accept change because of the astonishing wealth slavery represents.
There is a connection between the protagonists that neither fully understands as they find themselves, in
very different ways, representing Haiti at moments of potential rebirth . . .
About the Author
Nick Lake, Editorial Director of HarperCollins Children’s Books in the UK, has previously written about
vampire ninjas for younger readers, a series which started with a flippant joke about a gap in the market.
In Darkness not only won the 2013 Printz Award, but received three starred reviews, accolades in the New
York Times and the Wall Street Journal, and was named a Best book of the Year by Kirkus and an ALA Best
Fiction book for Young Readers. Lake has been fascinated with Haiti ever since he studied Krèyol during
a linguistics MPhil at Oxford. He writes during his thrice-weekly three-hour commute.
Find out more at: www.in-darkness.org or www.bloomsbury.com
For Discussion
1.
‘I have no name.’ (pg. 1)
‘He put his name in it, and that’s serious vodou.’ (pg. 16)
‘He had even styled himself Toussaint l’Ouverture for this opening in his teeth. The men in camp put it
about that he was called l’Ouverture for the openings he was able to create in enemy lines, and he smiled
even more at that. It had not been his intention in taking the name, but it was good nevertheless, for he
understood that when a soldier takes pride in his leader, it is his own self-respect and bravery that
benefits. He was a slave – he understood the power of names.’ (pg. 194-195)
2.
How powerful are names? Who in the book goes by their real name? Toussaint is named by his owner.
Who gave Biggie and Dread their names? What do their choices symbolize? And what about Shorty?
How significant is it that his nickname is the generic one for a young gang member? ‘There’s no such
thing as children in Site Solèy.’ (pg. 81)
‘I want you to understand that he was just a boy, really. Like me.’ (pg. 286)
Shorty shoots his first man at the age of twelve. Biggie was a kid when he killed Shorty’s father. Think of
Biggie on the phone to his mother on pg. 290-291. Does the fact they are young excuse anything they do?
Does it make what they do more understandable?
3.
‘It hurts every day as much as the first, as much as the last.’ (pg. 8)
‘I know I’ve killed people, and you probably think I’m an evil person, but I only did it to find Marguerite.’
(pg. 262)
What wounds are healed by time? Will Shorty’s wounds heal with more time? Do his feelings about his
sister excuse what he has done at all? Is it any different because they were twins?
4.
‘Me and Marguerite, we sat in the middle. We were special . . . We were smart, me and Marguerite;
we didn’t need to learn the same lesson twice.’ (pg. 74-75)
Shorty’s father is angry that his children are treated as ‘performing monkeys’ and Shorty clearly doesn’t
believe he was a spirit guide. Toussaint is skeptical when the vodou ceremony is performed which makes
him leader of the revolution. Yet, time and again, magic seems to have power. How real is magic in this
book? What is the connection between Shorty and Toussaint? What do they each gain from it?
Shorty and Marguerite are delivered by Aristide. Does this give them real power or symbolic power?
Does the fact that people believe they have power give them real power?
5.
‘He considered his father’s view – that all gods should be given their due, as being representatives of
the qualities people wished to nurture in themselves – to be largely correct.’ (pg. 40-41)
‘He polished the pwen with his sleeve, and slipped it into his pocket. This god had come all the way from
Africa to live in Boukman’s stone and Toussaint wouldn’t let its journey end with Boukman’s lifeless
body. He crossed himself.’ (pg. 131)
Is Toussaint’s view, taking aspects from different religions as they seem useful, a sophisticated one? Or is
it a muddle? What does it mean for religion? That all are equally valid? That they are different ways of
expressing a universal spirituality?
How does magic fit into this? If you think the stone does offer protection; if there is a spiritual connection
across time between Shorty and Toussaint, for instance?
6.
‘But you two must do your schoolwork, OK? Then maybe you can have a better freedom.’ (pg. 25)
Is this true? How much effect does being able to read and write have on Shorty’s life? How much does it
help Toussaint?
7.
‘The next day, coming onto the path to the Coste plantation, they had seen streaks of her blood.
Seeing it there . . . he had understood something of the fine line that separated good men from bad.’
(pg. 101)
How does Lake deal with this ambivalent line? Who in the book is ‘good’? Dread Wilmè feeds people in
Site Solèy, but he’s a gangster. What is the impact of having power over other people, whether that power
comes by guns or by the institution of slavery?
8.
‘Now, particularly because Boukman was dead, it was Toussaint who had to think about crops and
governance, and what happened when the slavers wanted their land back. It was Toussaint who had
to think about justice, and order.’ (pg. 140)
What responsibilities come with power? How important is it that Toussaint refuses to be a king or
emperor? What does this mean for the kind of power he wants to exercise?
9.
‘Stéphanie was kissing Biggie, her tongue in his mouth, and that made me nearly as sick as the blood
all over the place. She pulled away and she smiled at me, a strange smile.’ (pg. 191)
What is going on here? Is Lake saying something about the kind of person who is attracted to danger and
gangsters? Is he saying something about the kind of Westerner who gets a thrill out of being in trouble
spots? Is he saying something about the whole nature of the West’s self-regarding intervention in things it
doesn’t understand and can escape itself?
Stéphanie may have taken Biggie’s baby back to France with her. Is this symbolic?
10. ‘Sometimes when I was holding a gun it was like the gun wanted to kill people, not me. Never me.
That was a lie I just told you. I’m sorry. I don’t know why I’d lie. You know perfectly well that I’ve
wanted to kill people in my time, and that I’ve done it, too.’ (pg. 303)
What is Lake saying about the nature of guns? And about taking responsibility?
11. ‘Slaves: nine hundred million francs. Exports: two hundred million francs.’ (pg. 235)
The French and English both want Haiti for economic reasons. Does that make their behavior better or
worse than if they thought the slaves were subhuman? Or did they think that as well? And if they did,
does it make their behavior more understandable?
12. Toussaint blesses Jean-Christophe for the pale skin which lets him blend in enough with the whites to
spy. What do you think Jean-Christophe feels about this?
13. Did you know the story of Toussaint previously? Did you know he would be betrayed? Did you
know Marguerite was dead? How did Lake signpost his plot? How did he use your expectations and
how did he subvert them? Did you find the narrative gripping?
14. ‘We are all trapped in a cave and that cave is ourselves. The shape of its walls moves like water; this
barrier disturbs what little light gets in and makes everything we see unique to us.’ (pg. 318)
‘But now I’ve been reborn.’ (pg. 337)
Metaphors of birth and rebirth suffuse Lake’s book. What is Toussaint saying about his womb-like
cave? There is an obvious echo of Plato in the idea that we only see our own flickering version of
reality in the small light the cave gives us. What do you think about the way Lake has renamed that
central idea of Western philosophy and given Toussaint ownership of it? How will such ideas be
reborn?
15. The whole process of Shorty’s rescue is a rebirth from the darkness, a symbolic birth at a moment of
cataclysm, just as his first birth was. What has he learnt from Toussaint while underground? Is this a
hopeful story?
Beyond the Book
Creative Writing Ideas
Lake uses Haiti to explore themes of identity and power. It may have been that he wanted to tackle these themes; it
may have been that he wanted to write about Haiti and these themes grew out of that. But it is easy to see how, if he
had chosen to write about the NASA moon landings, he would have had different themes; and if he had wanted to
write about the influence of the media he would have picked a different setting. Setting and theme are always
linked . . .
• Where and when do you want to set your story? Why? Does it suit a particular theme or are you
inspired by a specific story you have heard about?
• How much research must you do? Your readers shouldn’t be distracted by constantly thinking
e.g. ’They’d never wear those clothes!’ What research do you need to do?
• How to achieve a sense of place? Do you constantly mention road names? Do you describe how things
look? How do you know? Is it somewhere you know or are you relying on other people’s descriptions, or
even photographs?
• How do you write about a different period? What was the effect of weather? Electricity? Could people
see at night? Could they stay warm? What did they eat?
• How will your characters speak? Language is an excellent way of making a reader feel as if they are
somewhere else. But it can also be distracting. If you are writing about a Spanish ship in the Armada, for
instance, you are not going to write in Spanish. Do you try to write in English but with a sense of the
period?
• How will your characters speak (2)? Do young people speak differently when they are talking to adults
and when they are talking among themselves? How do you make sure each character speaks
appropriately?
• Will you feature real people? If you are featuring real historical characters, how accurate will you be
about their lives? Will you invent things or stick solely to facts you have found? Will they be major or
minor characters?
• What about magic? Does magic exist in the world you are describing? If so, what are the rules?
Plotting
• What is your overall story? And how long is it? Who are the main characters, what do they want and
what do they have to do in order to get it? Do they get it or don’t they? What problems will they face?
Who helps them and who stands in their way?
• What event triggers the action? A crisis, a new character, a fact which is suddenly learned?
• Plan the action carefully. Action is not just swordfights and running away. Every meal and
conversation is part of the action; so is a description of a tree. How does it move the story forward or
change what the reader thinks?
• Think about signposts. What clues do you want to give your reader about what to expect?
• What mistakes do the characters make? Perfect characters are boring. What do they get wrong? What
do they learn?
• Be clear about your ending. Your ending rewards the reader for paying attention. The characters
should either succeed or fail in getting what they want. We should know what they think about the events
of the story. Are they happy about what’s happened or not? Have they changed, or learned anything?
Learn More
• Haiti’s difficult history is well sketched by Wikipedia, but more interesting is another collaborative site,
the L’Ouverture Project, which is devoted specifically to understanding the revolution of 1791–1804:
thelouvertureproject.org
• Many sites are devoted to the Haitian earthquake. The BBC’s is an excellent introduction:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/americas/2010/haiti_earthquake/default.stm.
The American podcast Planet Money has produced an excellent series on the quake’s aftermath and
Haiti’s rebuilding:
http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2011/01/12/132860125/planet-money-on-haiti
• Ghosts of Cite Soleil is a powerful documentary about Site Solèy featuring the controversy about
gangsterism and Dread Wilmè: www.ghostsofcitesoleil.com
• An overview of vodou can be found at:
http://altreligion.about.com/od/alternativereligionsaz/p/vodou.htm
A powerful collection of photographs published in Life magazine gives a picture of Haitian vodou:
www.life.com/gallery/62471/inside-haitian-vodou#index/0
• Gang culture differs between cities, but there are general tendencies. Here is a very good introduction:
http://people.howstuffworks.com/street-gang.htm
Further Reading
• Blood Ninja by Nick Lake
• Revolution by Jennifer Donnelly
• Sektion 20 by Paul Dowswell
• Haiti, The Tumultuous History by Philippe Girard
• A Long Way Gone: The True story of a Child Soldier by Ishmael Beah
• A World of Gangs: Armed Young Men and Gangsta Culture by John Hagedorn
• Fighting Chance: Tackling Britain’s Gang Culture by Patrick Regan