Icy Sparks

By Gwyn Hyman Rubio

 

I found this book by chance at a second-hand book shop. The shop had an interesting collection and I was looking for cooking and gardening books, which are always expensive in the main bookstores. But I fell for this book's cover, depicting a lone child in a white dress on a deserted road. The image is in black and white and somehow I could feel the loneliness of the child. To top it up, there was the interesting synopsis.

It tells the story of young Icy Sparks in a beautiful village on the Kentucky Mountains. It is a perfect setting for the young Icy, taken care by her beloved grandparents Mattani and Pattani. When Icy is expected to be innocent and childish, ticks and bouts of cursing begin. She hides it as long as she could until the villainous Mrs. Stilton decides otherwise.

Icy's only solace is Ms. Emily, an obese and warm lady owning a store in the town. Alienated from the town's people because of her obesity, she shares the same feelings as Icy. Icy's grandparents decide to send her to a special hospital for her then unknown but later identified Tourette's syndrome.

Icy finds herself alone in the hospital, unable to blend in with the mentally ill children. Then, there are typical characters from a mental hospital to make matters worse--bizarre kids, an evil caretaker, a poignant caretaker and the quintessentially dignified doctor. After a short episode at the hospital, Icy is sent home, where she decisively isolates herself from the town. But she never misses her shares of adventures in her own world.

A similarly outcast friend for his 'Frog Eyes' falls in love with Icy. When her illness takes over during one of their love encounters, Icy is back to square one. The situation worsens when Pattani dies, leaving Mattani depressed. Mattani and Ms. Emily take her to a local church for a religious ceremony, where she gets some sort of enlightenment. She identifies her gifted voice and becomes a successful adult she wants to be.

The author has done a great job in revealing the beauty of rural Kentucky. The mountain flowers, their cabin, Mattani's cooking, Pattani's warmth are some of the things that linger in my mind when I think of the book. The characters are warm although sometimes impractical. The mental hospital episode was boring and it did not add any spice to the story. Icy transition to optimism could have been gradual, instead of one shot at the church.

Read it once