Shortly before the finale of this season of LOST aired, I got my hands on a copy of Signs of Life,
the third in a series of tie-in novels about the epic
stuck-on-a-mysterious-island drama. I found it very disappointing, but
not as disappointing as the prospect of enduring the rest of the year
without any new installments of my favorite current series. So I rushed
to the website of the Erie County Library and discovered that I could
read the first two books in the series in electronic format. Hoping for
the best, I downloaded both and was pleased to find that author Cathy
Hapka demonstrated much greater skill and familiarity with the show than
Frank Thompson, at least with Secret Identity, the second of her efforts.
Her first outing, while still considerably better than Thompson's, is
not as successful as her second, which impressed me more than it should
have simply because Signs of Life was so dreary. Entitled Endangered Species, it runs parallel to Secret Identity
in that it covers roughly the same time span of the first few days
after the crash of Flight 815. The star red-shirt this time around is
Faith Harrington, a graduate student passionate about ecology and
wildlife, particularly snakes. Very quiet and unassertive, she has a
tendency to get yanked around by people with more forceful personalities
preying on her desire to make a positive difference in the world.
Faith is a sympathetic character, clearly a kind-hearted young woman
who could be a valuable asset given her expertise. She and Arzt ought to
put their heads together; I was a bit disappointed that he didn't have a
role to play in this book, since I think they would have complemented
each other nicely. She reminds me of myself, which is perhaps why I
often found myself so frustrated with the way her rampant insecurities
lead her to either hang back, so overwhelmed and intimidated that she is
immobilized, or go along with the orders of somebody else even when her
gut instinct tells her she shouldn't. She comes across as a bit whiny
on the island, while in the flashback chapters she allows herself to be
manipulated in a series events that rather obviously are leading to a
calamitous conclusion. She puts her trust in the wrong people while
allowing a moment of disillusionment to destroy a cherished
relationship.
The writing in this novel is not as artful as in Secret Identity;
the narration often comes across as rather cliched and bland. Moreover,
Faith's actions leading up to the event necessitating her quick
departure from Australia seem awfully dim-witted to me. Jeff and Dexter,
the protagonists in the other books, also made some pretty grievous
errors, but Faith just doesn't seem to be paying attention. Or maybe
she's too blinded by love to realize what's happening. But when her
overzealous activist boyfriend talks her into going to Australia to
protest the lecture of her former mentor, it's only one in a series of
very poorly considered decisions on her part. I guess the point is that
the island is supposed to give her some backbone. Does it succeed?
Perhaps the biggest problem with Endangered Species
is that the main character with whom Faith interacts on the island was
invented for this book. When I spotted a couple references to him in Secret Identity,
I assumed the middle-aged, talkative George must have been a throwback
to this first novel, and I was right. The trouble is that even more than
the island and all its inherent enigmas, what makes LOST
compelling is its characters, so if people are picking up a book based
on the show, they want to read about Jack, Kate, Hurley, Charlie, Sun,
Jin and all the other castaways they've come to love. I can accept the
decision to put the focus on characters who haven't been explored on the
show, but in order for this to really feel like something that is part
of the LOST universe, there needs to be a bit more involvement from the main players.
It doesn't help that although George is described as a pleasantly
gregarious fellow, he's actually rather obnoxious, bossing Faith around
minutes after meeting her and blowing a gasket because of her
environmentalist views. His violent reaction is explained somewhat when
we learn that his job as a real estate developer causes frequent clashes
with people of Faith's persuasion, but his behavior is still less than
laudable and has a pronounced negative effect on her, particularly when
he needlessly squashes a spider that she points out.
What
bothers me most about George is the fact that we're seeing him instead
of the established castaways. Faith's interaction with most of them is
minimal, in some cases limited to just a passing glance. She has brief
conversations with Sawyer, Sayid and several others and forms the
beginnings of friendships with Hurley and Claire. If I recall correctly,
the back cover blurb on this seemed to indicate some sort of
confrontation between her and John, but he actually seems poised to
mentor Faith as he did with Charlie, Boone, Claire and several of the
other castaways. It would have been nice to see that explored a bit
more; as it is, she interacts with John, Claire and Hurley more than
anyone else other than George, but all three relationships seem pretty
tangential.
If you're a devoted fan looking for something to
ease the wait until the fourth season, it might be worth it to see if
your local library carries these books. This one is the longest, and
even so it's barely longer than 200 pages, so you won't be wasting hours
upon hours on shoddy writing. The story is engaging enough, but if you
want a decent dose of all those fantastic characters from the show, Secret Identity is the only one of the three that really delivers. Something tells me the LOST tie-in novel is an endangered species...
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