Return Fare

Jerry McDonnell was a teacher and librarian the F.E. Madill Secondary School in Wingham, Ontario.

This is a disturbing novel for at least two reasons. Although it seems to be aimed at an adolescent or young adult audience, it portrays a good deal of sexual brutality and the outlook of the story is both fatalistic and bleak.

Fifteen-year-old Jamey has left his British Columbia home to hitchhike down the west coast of the United States after a rift with his girlfriend’s mother and a shadowy problem with his own family. His experiences go from bad to worse as he becomes involved with alien migrant farm workers; he is shocked at the way they are treated. He travels on. When he runs out of money he attempts to join the United States Army but while being held for investigation he is mixed in with some illegal aliens who are being sent to a secret detention centre. A simple bureaucratic mistake is made and Jamey’s fate is sealed.

The prisoners and guards are equally brutal, and after Jamey loses his protector, he becomes the personal property of another prisoner and is repeatedly raped. Rescue eventually comes through a deus ex machina and Jamey is deported to Vancouver.

Life seems to be improving at this point until we learn that Jamey’s girlfriend has been killed in an accident and that he must return to his shadowy but somehow threatening family.

The novel probably presents conditions of the 1950s realistically but it would be suitable only for very mature readers because of the almost un-relievedly pessimistic view of life. No matter what the hero does, life is not going to improve very much. There are kind people, but their actions are always negated by others.