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In LITTLE STAR, Swedish author John Ajvide Lindqvist (LET THE RIGHT ONE IN) sets out with an ambitious and fascinating story that follows two young girls from infancy to their teenage years as they discover their independence, the internet, a love for music, and ultimately each other. The novel begins when a washed-up musician and overall degenerate, Lennart Cedestrom, discovers an abandoned infant girl in the forest and brings her home to his disillusioned wife Laila. Though we never quite understand why Lennart insists so strongly on keeping her, he and Laila decide to raise the girl, who never speaks and continues to eat only baby food well into her teenage years. They keep her in the basement and reveal her existence only to their adult son, Jerry, who is constantly afoul of the law. Despite the fact that the child (whom they never get around to naming) is unable to talk, she has her adoptive parents' musical talents; even as a child she has a strong predilection for early Bowie and a beautiful singing voice. Lennart and Laila find bliss and newfound meaning in their new life with their little girl, and but soon meet their demise in a quick and brutal manner, leaving ne'er-do-well Jerry responsible for the girl, whom he comes to nickname Theres. Jerry, always with an eye for avenues to money and fame, recognizes his sister's musical talents and decides to enter her into a popular televised singing reality show; while her vocal talents are undeniable, her prickly personality leads to her being voted off the show in short order. But as a result of Theres's appearance, a young girl named Teresa, who struggles with depression and delusionary thoughts, becomes obsessed with Theres. In a wild coincidence they meet on a website devoted to the poetry of teenage girls, build an online friendship and eventually meetface to face. Quickly, Theres and Teresa become quite the duo and start writing songs together and become inseparable as they become viral internet sensations and attract the attentions of a lecherous musical agent and a growing contingent of teenage groupies. Tragically, the combined talents, eccentricities, and mental imbalances of the two girls lead to severe and dark consequences to all those around them. LITTLE STAR is a compelling, deeply ambitious novel that is weighed down by its flaws and a desire to do entirely too much. Lindqvist presents a highly readable and interesting plot and characters, but seems never to be quite clear what he wants to do with them. The novel appears to want to explore themes of sexuality and friendship, of exploitation in the digital and reality television era, and teen mental illness; but never really examines these themes once they are introduced. Similarly, while suspension of disbelief is, of course, expected in the horror genre, that is often made up for by characters grounded in reality, which are not to be found here. Lennart is presented as a narcissistic degenerate, yet as soon as he sets eyes on Theres, he is obsessed with keeping her at all costs—with little explanation. It is a pity in an otherwise crisp novel that the glaring omission of character motivations and a failure to address themes that the novel presents in any detail drags down Lindqvist's impressive creation to a certain extent. While these problems ultimately do not harm the overall narrative too much, they are unfortunate and prevent the novel from reaching even greater heights than it does. Even so, LITTLE STAR is an impressive novel and a good read that avoids becoming tedious or overly dense is too often the case with Swedish literature in translation and is an excellent choice for a Halloween read as we approach that ghoulish holiday. § Ben Neal is a public librarian in northeastern Tennessee and likes to fancy himself an amateur writer, humorist, detective, and coffee connoisseur in his spare time. He can be reached at beneneal@indiana.edu.
Reviewed by Ben Neal, October 2012
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