Archimede Fusillo

Dead Dog in the Still of the Night
By Archimede Fusillo
RRP $18.95

Sometimes the idea and the execution don’t match up. Sometimes there is more to solving the problem than the solution you first thought of.
That’s how it is with Primo, the lead protagonist from Dead Dog in the Still of the Night. His father is in a nursing home, his mother is at her wits end, and one of his older brothers, Adrian, has been forced back into the family home after being away for several years.

Primo, which means first in Italian, is neither the first born, nor the first son, in the Nato family. But for years now he has been the male in the household, helping his mother, trying to keep his relationship with the beautiful and clever Maddie on track, and dreaming about finally getting his driver’s licence so he can get behind the wheel of his father’s prized car, the Fiat 500 Bambino – a motoring classic, and the pride of his father’s life.

Year 12 is making demands on Primo’s time, demands he can’t seem to keep pace with, not when there is the real possibility that Adrian will be divorced soon and forced back home for good. Not when Maddie has started putting the pressure on about the two of them jetting off to Europe as Primo had promised her he would once he got through the last of his secondary school years.

And not when the eldest brother Santo decides he will assert his position by reopening the once profitable, but long ago abandoned service station, and use the Fiat as the centrepiece for attracting cashed-up clients.
So when Adrian finds himself cornered by the woman who accuses him of sexual harassment, when his wife threatens to take their daughter from him, Primo steps in to take advantage of the situation by offering a quick-fix solution to his brother’s problems-and make much needed cash in the process.

The problem is the dead dog that Primo’s best mate Tone has in the back of the hearse he uses to deliver the pizza’s for his father’s pizzeria. The dog Tone ran over accidentally but never got round to burying. The mangy, rotting dog Primo decides to dump on the doorstep of his brother’s spurned mistress in the misguided belief it will act as a warning for her to back off.

What Primo can’t know yet, what he can’t factor in, are the tendrils of association between the woman, his part time job, and the stench of misplaced bravado that could lead to catastrophic consequences for each member of his family, his father included.

Dead Dog in the Still of the Night is a novel about the price paid for loyalty, duty and obligation within families, between friends, and the shortsightedness of acting out of self-interest and resentment. It is a story about the ability of mateship to offer hope and redemption, and the power of love within family to heal the deepest, most bitter hurts.
A must read for anyone from primary to secondary.

Terrie Saunders… (meer)

(I should warn you this is an analytical essay I did for school, so there are a lot of spoilers and it probably won't make sense to those who haven't read it. Please do not copy. Thanks.)

Bruises: Boys Don’t Cry, a novel by Archimede Fusillo, is a book about the way men and boys relate to each other. It challenges the common perception that men cannot express any emotion other than rage. Through Falco’s and Ape’s relationship with their older brothers, we can see how this perception is both confirmed and challenged by the men young boys look up to. Ape, the antagonist, is the embodiment of all the constant pressures young boys face from their peers and society to act “manly” yet not give in to themselves. And through Brad, we can see how society’s idea of what a man should be can harm boys, and the danger Falco was in of becoming like him.

Falco and Ape are more similar than we initially realise. Their relationships with their older brothers directly influence their lives. Despite the fact that Val and Jack represent the opposite ends of the spectrum, they each play an important part in a young man’s life. Page 119: "Jack the crim, the failure. Valentino the fighter. The hardened crim and the beloved martyr." With Falco, we see how Val has taught him valuable lessons about life and letting go – of his rage, of Val himself, and of the pressure he feels from his parents. Despite Val’s own suffering, he is there for Falco, and vice versa. In comparison, Ape and Jack have a very volatile relationship – Jack teaches Ape that he has to win; to be the leader, the hero, at all costs. It is implied that Jack in prison was abused, so perhaps this is when Ape learns that he must be a “leader.” Ape has a very twisted idea of what a “leader” is. Crowning Falco the “leader”, to Ape, is a way of acknowledging that he is the true tyrant and toying with Falco’s mind to make himself feel better. Val and Jack each teach Falco and Ape very different lessons about life, and while Falco is able to stand alone, Ape cannot let go of the idea of Jack as a hero. At the end of the novel, he still terrorises those “beneath” him. Page 189, pp 1: ‘“Ape was too busy circling a group of Year 7 kids by the look of them, and prodding their backpacks, to notice me, […] He’s grown his hair long again, like it was before camp, and he’s got a loop earring, but apart from that you couldn’t miss him. […] Did I really expect him to be so starkly different I wouldn’t recognise him?”'
Yet Ape, despite feeling scared himself deep down, keeps constant pressure on all the boys.

This brings us to Ape as a character. He is the antagonist in some ways, but also helps Falco learn some valuable lessons by example of what Falco could become if he didn’t let go of his bitterness. Through his constant stirring of the boys in bunkhouse five, Ape places pressure on the whole group to act to his ends. When not fighting him, he tries harder to get a reaction from the boys, and when they do snap, he seizes to opportunity to humiliate them and enforce his position as leader. Calling Falco the “fearless leader” shows that Ape knows Falco is scared of him – yet he can’t admit his own fear. Page 50, pp 1: ‘“At least I’m not a deviant, eh,” Ape added curtly.’ A throwaway comment to deflect criticism? Or does this comment represent a deeper level of Ape’s fear – being singled out, daring to go without Jack as his protector? And speaking of standing alone, how has this affected Brad?

Brad. The tragic figure of the story – whose death makes Falco realise how scared people like Ape really are. Page 182, pp 3: "Poor Brad, Falco thought. He must have been so scared. Deep down people like Ape and Jack terrified Brad. But deep down Ape and Jack were probably just as scared. Val was scared." Having no one to confide in, and the one person he should be able to with enforcing the message that he wasn’t good enough, Brad was just an angry and scared boy. He died because he gave up and went along with Ape in the end – he dared Cannucia to go in the water like Ape. And when Cannucia did, and he struggled, Brad leapt into the water and saved him, perhaps just to be brave once. It could be speculated that Brad let himself drown. After all, he could ‘swim like a fish’. He might have saved himself. But Brad may have just wondered what he had left to live for. A father’s and a society’s expectations and condemnation may have been all he could see. Page 153, pp 4: "It was obvious to Falco that Brad too was searching for answers. Brad wanted, needed, to know why he’d been targeted so fiercely by the boys at his former school […] Maybe there weren’t any answers at all." Falco could have been Brad – he could have given up. But Falco had Val, and the mantra. Give me strength to live out the night. Give me hope to last another day. Give me courage to bear my pain. Give me time to grow old. And if you can’t, then help me to understand why. Brad could not understand why.

Yes, Bruises certainly challenges the idea that all a man can feel is rage. Falco’s grief, Ape’s fear, Cannucia’s cowardice and Brad’s despair are all the emotions that any man can feel. But it is a shame that they must feel it at all.… (meer)

Normally I am a huge fan of Archie Fusillo's work but I think this book didn't quite hit the mark as I did not warm to any of the characters in it except for the italian grandmother! It is basically two stories, the first is set in the present day where Alex is slowly losing his grip on reality as he struggles with the impending death of his mother (who is in a hospice for the dying), his "love" for Ces another student in his Year 12, his quest to be the artist his mother struggled to be, his claustrophobic, disapproving italian family and the re-appearance of his brother who has been living with Alex's estranged Dad in Queensland. Coupled with this is his mother's dying wish that she read the manuscript of a book she has written about episodes in the life of the artist Michelangelo Caravaggio; which leads us to the other story in the novel - Caravaggio's fiery artistic temperament and his need to paint the true religious paintings that caused him to be banished and shunned by the clergy in his lifetime. Basically, I found the Caravaggio part quite interesting although I thought he came across as an obstinate, arrogant prat. Therefore as Alex models himself on this figure, he becomes similar and his poor boyfriend Ces is dragged along for the ride ( although he himself is portrayed as money-grubbing on the back of Alex's talent in his wish to buy himself a cool motorbike.) I thought the grandfather was as bad as the uncle and the mother an absolutely useless figure who had corrupted her son. Therefore, it's extremely hard to recommend this book because all the characters were so disagreeable.… (meer)