Black Swan Green

Jason receives a letter addressed to his alter ego: “Eliot Bolivar, Poet.” He arrives at the appointed time at the vicarage only to find it’s not in use as a vicarage but instead home to a mysterious Belgian woman, Madame Eva van Outryve de Crommelynck. A butler answers the door and shows Jason to the solarium, where Madame Crommelynck interrogates him about his poetry. Their conversations over the subsequent weeks are revealing: Jason learns about Madame Crommelynck’s family, including her father the composer and her life during the war; while Jason reveals that his poetry must be kept an absolute secret at the risk of horrible teasing from his schoolmates. As a result of the incident in the previous chapter, Jason is once again the object of scorn from his schoolmates. As he exits the bus one day, Ross Wilcox shoves him from behind, and Jason falls into a mud puddle, to the amusement of everyone on the bus, including the driver.

Madame Crommelynck encourages him to write under his own name, to understand that too much beauty spoils his writing, and to read quality literature. She lends him a copy of Le Grand Meaulnes, and Jason spends a week translating the first chapter from French.

When he returns to the vicarage a week later, Madame Crommelynck and her butler are gone. The vicar and his wife explain that the Crommelyncks were extradited back to Germany for financial impropriety. Jason realizes that the man he thought was the butler was Madame Crommelynck’s husband all along. Leaving the vicarage for the last time, Jason feels empty and confused.

Jason goes along on his father’s business trip to Lyme Regis. His father gives him spending money, so Jason wanders around with the other tourists while his father is in meetings. In the arcade he talks to a pretty girl but is humiliated by the girl’s friends and gives up. His father sends a young associate, Danny Lawlor, to keep Jason company. Danny buys Jason ice cream; they also watch kites flying and share dinner. Jason is amazed to learn Danny is an orphan and was raised by monks. Danny dreams of finding his maternal relatives so he can have photographic proof of people who look like him.

Back at the hotel room, Jason waits for his father to return so they can go see Chariots of Fire, but his father returns hours late with an excuse about visiting with his boss. When he sees the kite Jason bought with his spending money, his father promises that they’ll go down to the beach early the next morning to fly it. When his father goes out again, Jason doubts the kite-flying will happen. The sight of his father later that night, drunk and naked, alarms Jason—but this is all forgotten in the morning, when his father wakes early to fly the kite with him. His father also buys him a fossil, which Jason identifies as a lytoceras fimbriatum. While his father tells him about the fossil, Craig Salt, his father’s boss, arrives and incorrectly identifies the fossil as a trilobite. Although Jason’s father is right, he allows Craig Salt to correct him, and the trip ends on a bitter note.

Jason goes to Cheltenham with his mother. They visit some antique shops in the area to find a replacement for his grandfather’s watch, which he broke in January. The replacement cost of an Omega Seamaster turns out to be 850 pounds—far more than Jason can afford.

When he visits his mother’s store, three girls enter. Jason is attracted to one of the girls and is watching her closely when he sees her pocket a pair of opal earrings. He alerts his mother, who proves to be extremely tough. Even though the shoplifter protests that she has done nothing wrong and that her lawyer will be calling, Jason’s mom calls the girl’s bluff and retrieves the earrings.

Jason’s mom takes him to see Chariots of Fire as a reward. Jason feels a little uneasy about this; it’s social suicide to be seen with one’s mother at the movies. But they are in Cheltenham, and he hasn’t seen anyone he knows.

After, Jason asks his mother why his parents haven’t taken any trips together this summer. His mother is evasive, citing inflexible jobs and vague “problems” between them.