Review: The Boy with the Cuckoo-Clock Heart
By Maggie Galehouse on March 21, 2010 at 12:00 AM
Reviewed by Jenny Dial
Mathias Malzieu's The Boy with the Cuckoo-Clock Heart is a whimsical fairy-tale of a book — for adults. It's like a dark version of Alice in Wonderland or Pinocchio with strippers and prostitutes.
But Malzieu, a French rock star, somehow pulls it off without being too creepy.
The novel takes the reader on a fantastic voyage with the main character, Little Jack, who is born on the coldest day on Earth. Because of the chill, his heart freezes, and he is near dead when his mother abandons him and leaves him with Dr. Madeleine, a sort of mad scientist who fits him with a cuckoo-clock heart.
Dr. Madeleine warns Little Jack never to fall in love because his heart would break once more. No surprise here, Little Jack falls immediately in love.
The book follows him as he runs away, befriends a clock-maker who becomes his companion and heads on a trek through Europe (in the late 1880s), in search of his love, Miss Acacia. He finds her in an old circus converted into a fun-fair, where he gets a job on the ghost train and tries to win her heart.
The more Little Jack falls in love, the more his heart pounds; the hands go crazy and the cuckoo sounds. It is a simple metaphor. His heart breaks — literally — when his mother leaves him and is in danger of breaking when Miss Acacia may not want him.
The message is delivered in a creative way, but like an old Brothers Grimm fairy tale, it's a little overdone with descriptions of every person and every setting. Sometimes the story loses its flow.
The theme of love is a big one in the book, as is the loss of innocence. Little Jack speaks often of his dreams and how hard it is when confronted with reality.
While The Boy with the Cuckoo-Clock Heart gives the reader a fanciful look at Little Jack's world — and there are plans to turn the novel into an animated film in the near future — it is not a story suitable for children. There is a hamster with a pornographic name, prostitution and a graphic fight in the book.
This is a quick and entertaining read that people who like fantasy-fiction and folk tales will appreciate.
Jenny Dial covers sports for the Houston Chronicle.
Maggie Galehouse | Books editor, features reporter
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