AUTHOR: Catherine Ryan HydeTITLE: Chasing Windmills PUBLISHER: Vintage272 Pages
There are many opportunities for the plot to turn melodramatic in Catherine Ryan Hyde's Chasing Windmills.
While Hyde may not be a household name, her work has not been overlooked. Her novel was the premise of the like-named 2000 film, Pay It Forward, featuring doe-eyed Haley Joel Osment (of The Sixth Sense fame).
Pay It Forward examined a social experiment stemming from a child's simple idea to make the world a better place. At the heart of it, the novel explored the long-reaching repercussions from simple actions. In that sense, Chasing Windmills follows suit.
The novel is written in first person; the voice switches between the two main characters as the chapters change. These main characters are Sebastian and Maria.
Sebastian is a 17-year-old boy who lives with and is homeschooled by his father. From the very first page, it is clear that the suffocating, restrained lifestyle that he lives is detrimental. His father shelters him from other youth, processed foods, outside education and instead exposes him to such things as classical music. At one point, Sebastian even notes that it affected him physically, causing him to become ill.
The father, while only physically appearing in the novel a handful of times, is a central character. However, for being so integral to the plot, his motives are never thoroughly explained.
Of course, this can be due to the fact that the reader is never allowed insight to his thoughts. There is an onslaught of analysis and guess-work by various other characters in the novel, but the father's strange wishes for Sebastian are never quite explained as well one might like.
Initially, he develops a strict running regimen, but from this stems even more desire to escape the influence of his father. This desire is cultivated by his one friend, Delilah. Although Delilah may be past her prime in life, she has no lack of advice to offer Sebastian and encourages him to explore the city he lives in.
A large part of the novel takes place in New York City. Although he resides in the "city that never sleeps," Sebastian had rarely seen outside the walls of his apartment. As the novel progresses, he expands both his mental and geographical boundaries and begins the slow transition from a boy to a man.
Maria, however, only in her lower 20s, was forced into adulthood when she gave birth to her daughter. Now, a young mother of two, she struggles with raising her children and living the life that was thrust upon her.
She lives with the father of her son, Carl, but the father is far from a white knight. Instead, he behaves towards her with slight aggressiveness that occasionally becomes full-fledged abuse.
Although she has every right to, Maria doesn't complain. Hyde has crafted this character into the victim that a reader will love to be empathetic towards. At no point does Maria's vulnerability and less-than-dominant personality begin to become irritating. In fact, it is incredibly easy to find one nodding his head, thinking that Maria is completely justified in her actions.
Maria and Sebastian's paths cross one night on the subway, and from there the plot of the novel begins to shift course. With a simple glance shared among two people held victim by their own fears, their lives are changed.
This is where Hyde has the opportunity to transform the novel from a realistic portrayal of human interaction to one that is plagued with melodrama. Thankfully, she does not. Instead, the plot plods along at a deliciously tranquil rate, focusing on the intricacies of every emotion and action.
With a few nods to West Side Story (the film for which Maria was named), readers will be clamoring to decide if this is, in fact, a star-crossed love story.
But as the novel progresses even more, Hyde will have readers asking if this really is a conventional love story at all. Instead, perhaps the love story being told is the one where individuals learn to love themselves.
The titular windmills appear as motifs throughout the novel, adding to the contrast between the city life, and the idealized, free life away from the skyscrapers and commotion. At first, they serve as symbols of hope for Sebastian, and then, for Maria.
Chasing Windmills is full of opposites: freedom and imprisonment, being the victim and being the hero, maturity and innocence, lies and truth. However, instead of a barrage of contradictory themes, Hyde subtly crafts them into a novel that explores the way they interact and mesh.
Chasing Windmills develops deep questions throughout its entirety and ends with a satisfying finale.
It is by no means a difficult read. Instead, it is an incredibly short novel that the average reader could get through in a weekend.
But it is a good choice to read when one needs an alternate reality to dive into in order to escape impending thoughts of the upcoming week.
