Elaine Feeney || How to Build a Boat

Booker Prize Longlist 2023

I am not quite sure about How to Build a Boat. At times I felt it was getting a tad over the top. On the cover of my copy Douglas Stuart claims that How to Build is ‘a gorgeous gift of a novel, hopeful and full of humanity’. I agree with it being hopeful and being full of humanity. Maybe I would have appreciated its literary quality more if it had been less full of humanity.

Main character Jamie is a special child. Though Feeney never gives it a name, it is clear from the start that he in all probability is somewhere in the autism spectrum. His mum has died, his father is coping as well as he can with a son he cannot always understand. When Jamie goes to secondary school life becomes even more complicated. It is quite clear that though Jamie excels in certain areas of the curriculum, he fails in the social abilities.

Two teachers pay heed to him, they realise he needs special attention. One has him spend most of his breaks with her, the other one picks up on the fact that Jamie wants to invent and build a perpetuum mobile, a machine that never stops moving. He suggest building a currach, a traditional round boat. Jamie goes along with it though he has his doubts about the boat serving its purpose.

Jamie wants to build a perpetuum mobile because he believes that it will keep his mother alive in some miraculous way. The people around him all know this is never to going to happen, they go along with him because they do no want to disappoint him. Building the currach unintentionally becomes a way for Jamie to get included into the community. Something he does not crave it all, even resents when too many people turn up to help with the boat but succumbs to in the end. I’ll let you discover for yourselves how this comes about, just know that for me at that point the novel turned kind of corny.

Jamie’s school is not meant for children with a disability. It is however the only school in the vicinity he can get to without the help of his father. It becomes clear at a certain point that the school would rather get rid of Jamie, that the head is keen to have students who stand out – not as much in excellence as in obedience. Jamie excels in mathematics, the boy who is the exemplary pupil in the eyes of the head runs off with all the prizes. Feeney makes it very clear she does not share the head’s view on excellence, she is obviously in favour of more independent minds.

Teachers Tess and Tadgh are said independent minds. They find themselves in trying to take care of Jamie and in their disapproval of the school rejecting all children that do not fit the profile. I do not think it’ll come as a surprise there will be a love interest. Both Tess and Tadgh can take an emotional step forward through helping Jamie and through their friendship.

How to Build a Boat is beautifully written; Feeney has managed expertly to paint the picture of a boy who has difficulties coping in his community. Stuart is right when he says the novel is ‘hopeful’, it is also the problem about this novel. Everything is just slightly too hopeful, slightly too determined to have a community build a boat, a community take care of a child like Jamie. How to Build a Boat is definitely pleasant to read, I am not sure it has the literary qualities a Booker Prize Longlisted novel requires.