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willieloomissavescollinsport · 5 years

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Hawkes Harbor Review

"Surely, Louisa, you are not suggesting I take Jamie to Disneyland."

After a bestselling author's work is rejected, in a move of irony & karma, Dark Shadows finds ITSELF the subject of plagiarism. And now, brought to you by the letter 'H', here is my review of Hawkes Harbor by S.E. Hinton.

As the legends go, the novel 'Hawkes Harbor' was originally intended to be an entry in publishers HarperCollins' Dark Shadows series. What changes were made to the storyline & characters afterwards are hard to pinpoint, but for all pretense and purposes, I chose to read this book while mentally changing each character or location to its DS counterpart:

Jamie Sommers..........Willie Loomis Kellen Quinn............Jason McGuire Grenville Hawkes...Barnabas Collins Dr. Louisa Kahne...Dr. Julia Hoffman Sophia Marie........................Josette Katie Roddendem........Maggie Evans Richard..................................Roger Lydia.................................Elizabeth Ricky.....................................David Barbara...............................Carolyn Hawkes Harbor.................Collinsport Hawkes Hall......................Old House Terrace View....................Wyndcliffe

This comes in handy mostly because, with the exception of the 3 male leads, not many details are given regarding the other individuals mentioned in passing or who enter the storyline from time to time.

The plot itself more or less follows Willie's storyline early on the show, with some added details & flashback accounts to his time spent with Kellen/Jason, along with a few other changes. For starters, Jamie gets more tail in a chapter of this book than Willie could ever hope to get throughout his entire run on the show. He gets it on with a rich bitch who scratches his back up; with Katie/Maggie, IMMEDIATELY after Grenville/Barnabas kidnaps her; with two girls on a cruise ship, at the same time. Hell, even the book's equivalent of Nurse Jackson climbs into bed with him to give him a pity handjob.

Whereas onscreen, I think Willie only got as far as copping a feel while holding Maggie hostage.

And as I mentioned before, there are rather large sections of the book devoted to Jamie/Willie's backstory, which had previously been unexplored in the show's official canon. The story begins by showing Jamie/Willie, an out of wedlock child with a dying mother, being placed in an orphanage at the age of 7. There, his mother's heirloom crucifix necklace is taken away from him, hinting at his future fascination with shiny trinkets. In his adulthood, he enlists in the Navy & later befriends Kellen/Jason after defeating two Hawaiian men in a brawl.

For the years to follow, Kellen & Jamie primarly travel together on the high seas, makin' cons, makin' scams & fightin' round the world. During the course of their adventures: Jamie is accused of rape by a rich heiress who seduced him; Kellen tells a story where the punchline involves a frozen sausage; and the two are robbed by pirates while a shark attacks Jamie as he dives for a ruby.

After their resources are dried out, the duo end up back in the states in the town of Hawkes Harbor, Delaware/Collinsport, Maine. Which, of course, is where these characters were introduced on Dark Shadows. But since this isn't suppose to be a Dark Shadows novel, some of the details have been mixed around. For starters, instead of Kellen being Lydia/Elizabeth's husband's two-timing friend, HE is her husband. They were married overseas while Lydia/Elizabeth was working as a nurse for the war. After the marriage went sour, Kellen took a buyout to produce a death certificate, vanish & allow her to go back to her family as a widow.

Posing as the brother of Lydia's late husband, Kellen moves into the grand family mansion & collects clothes & money while Jamie stays at a boarding house nearby. There, he befriends one of the workers: Katie Roddendem/Maggie Evans, as well as her little sister Trisha(/Amy, perhaps?) & their mother, Mrs Pivens (who seems to be playing the role of Mrs Johnson, as evidenced by this line: "Well, my landlady, Mrs Pivens, she liked me. Don't ask me why-'cept she had a son around my age, he turned out bad. I guess she wanted to believe guys like us were good, deep down somewhere.") Ricky Hawkins/David also forms a bond with Jamie & later tells him of buried pirate treasures located in the caves of a nearby island, said to be haunted.

With just that information to go on, Jamie foolishly goes a treasure huntin' & unchains a coffin revealing vampire Grenville Hawkes/Barnabas Collins. Grenville, who's sounds more like a chain of motels than a scary vampire, puts Jamie under his power & to work on restoring Hawkes Hall/Old House. Now, it is worth mentioning that some changes were made to Grenville, from the Barnabas we all know & love/hate. Most notably, Jamie describes him as being around the age of 50, with no trying to pretend that the middle aged vampire was 25 when confined in a coffin. In addition, Grenville has had *gasp* MULTIPLE wives! One of which produced an offspring named William, which is perhaps a nod to the our protagonist's original name. Guess William also dodged a bullet in that he wasn't named Bramwell.

Some time after Gren's first wife passes on, he marries a young woman by the name of Sophia Marie/Josette. Soon afterwards, Grenville finds himself turned into one of the living dead. Sophia/Josette is all too anxious to join him in being eternally damned, but unfortunately for her, Bizarro-Barnabas will have none of that & decides chokes a bitch instead. Fast forward a few centuries and Grenville spots Katie/Maggie & makes up his mind that he wants Sophia/Josette to be a bloodsucking creature of the night after all! But here's where it gets WEIRD.

Instead of slowly brainwashing Katie into believing she IS Sophia, he plans to have Sophia's spirit, who just happens to be hanging around Hawkes Hall for no good reason, inhabit her body. I guess just like in 'Ghost', when Patrick Swayze jumps into Whoopi Goldberg or something. So, Gren attacks Katie & leaves her alone in the Hawkes Hall long enough for Jamie to find her, allowing THIS exchange to take place:

"Jamie," she said suddenly. "Make love to me." "W-w-what?" he stammered, drawing back from her, searching her eyes. "Make love to me. Now."

Yep, you've only got mere moments to escape, but why not do the nasty instead? I mean, it's not like an angry jealous killer vampire could walk in at any second or anything! Actually you know what? If I didn't believe it was impossible, I think Willie Loomis himself wrote this book. That's right, after hearing about his parallel time self being a famous writer, he thought to himself 'Well, why can't I do that?' And then he proceeded to write a thinly disguised biography of his life, giving everyone a different name & changing the events to the way he thought they SHOULD have happened!

Oh & here's another kicker, Katie/Maggie claims to be a virgin. Ha! Yeah, I know Joe is always shown sleeping on the couch in the show, but I've figured that was because Sam had a short fuse & a shotgun handy amidst his paintbrushes, just in case someone dared to lay a finger on his daughter. Trust me, if Maggie's a virgin, then Carolyn's in the freakin' convent. So Katie is saying that she wants her first roll in the hay to be with pretty boy Jamie instead of Count Hawkins. Actually I wonder if Grenville is even capable of performing such an act. Usually vampires in popular culture are as dead below the waist as the rest of their bodies, & Barnabas never seemed to be any exception. Sure he was interested in anything under 30 with a vagina who walked within his line of vision. But as a vampire, he never showed an interest in sinking anything except his fangs into a young lady.

But, getting back to our story. Jamie & Katie are engaging in some fluffy coitus. They kiss, they cry, they climax together. Cherubs come down from the heavens & sing. Then Grenny shows up & doesn't seem to show any reaction to the fact that some hard core nookie just took place in that very room. But no matter to that, because Grenville has to deliver some corny dialogue to his sweetie:

"Come, my heart, " the low voice beseeched the air. "Come and join me."

"All right!" (All right! Let's get this party started!) Jamie shouted as he struggled back up. "You go ahead and do this, kill Katie, I can't stop you. I seen people kill before-for money, God, or country, and you with your 'necessity for existence.' I even did it myself once. But don't you call it love! This isn't love!"

After that speech, I half expected Jamie to break out into song, but instead Sophia Marie talks through Katie, forming a ghostly glow over her body. The lovers embrace, kiss, cry, the cherubs come back for an encore & Sophia Marie/Josette basically tells Grenville that although she loves him, they can't really be together like this. A ghost & a vampire together? Might make for a decent mid season replacement sitcom, but doesn't lend itself to being very practical for real life.

So with Katie now useless, Grenville tells Jamie to get rid of her. Maybe he just meant to dump her in the trashcan out back for pickup, but Jamie takes Katie & runs for the hills. And who should see them on their way, but a Sheriff Patterson/Joe Haskell hybrid known as Mitch Morgan. To make matters worse, Katie is Mitch's main squeeze & she's been missing for awhile. Mighty Mitch takes aim & Jamie gets 3 bullets in his back, as opposed to Super-Willie who recieved FIVE & recovered in record time!

From there, Jamie is taken to a criminal insane ward & later transferred to Terrace View/Wyndcliffe under the request of Grenville & Dr. Louisa Kahne/Dr. Julia Hoffman. This is where the majority of the story takes place in the forms of flashbacks & remembrances while a physician named Dr. McDevitt conducts therapy sessions with Jamie. Which is an affective tool for storytelling, but I wouldn't really buy as being able to take place. Think about it. Would Julia really allow anyone to ask Willie questions, taking the risk that he might reveal something? Frankly, I've always imagined Willie as being kept heavily medicated & isolated in his room while at Wyndcliffe.

Oh, & while it's not even brought up until much later in the novel, you should know that, much like on the show, Kellen/Jason became worm food some time before Jamie got shot. Worse yet, instead of Grenville merely using Barnabas's trusted M.O. of strangling someone to death, here Grenville drinks all the blood from Kellen's body. And then orders Jamie to stake his friend to prevent him from rising as a vampire. Adding yet another thing to give Jamie nightmares at night.

After several months of being at Terrace View/Wyndcliffe, in following the storyline of Dark Shadows, Jamie/Willie is released into the care of Grenville & Dr. Louisa Kahne/Dr. Julia Hoffman, against the wishes of Dr. McDevitt. Grenville is magically now 99.9% vampire free but it's still alluded to that he needs shovels for misdeeds, which are never fully explained in detail. Meanwhile, Jamie has become the Boo Radley of Hawkes Harbor, with small children throwing rocks at him. And on top of that, from his ordeal & time spent in the institution, he's become greatly addicted to prescription drugs.

Following Jamie accidentally ODing on his pills, Louisa/Julia finally gets it through her thick wig that Jamie just may have problems & observes he's likely suffering from Stockholm syndrome. Although since this takes place in 1968 & that term will not be conceived until 1973, I guess Louisa took some trips to the future that we didn't know about. She suggests that Grenville should take him someplace to relax while he is gradually reduced from his meds, to which he reacts with this line:

"Surely, Louisa, you are not suggesting I take Jamie to Disneyland."

Oh man, I'd pay good money to see Barnabas & Willie in Disneyland! Can you imagine it? Within the first 24 hours, Willie will have beaten up Goofy & been banned for life from Mr. Toad's Wild Ride while Barnabas has already made plans to kidnap Snow White & turn her into his new Josette!

But unfortunately for us, Louisa/Julia has other plans in mind.

"Richard was saying..." she began. His look warned her he had little interest in what his cousin had to say, but she went on. "The Collins shipping industry needed to look into passenger cruises. They are the wave of the future-You know Roger and his puns."

(That above line is NOT a typo, by the way. For two sentences they let the names 'Collins' & 'Roger' slip through without changing them!)

"No," Grenville said. "No." "Of course he offered to go. But you could investigate for yourself. And it's not unusual for a man of your position and background to travel with a valet."

So, Grenville & Jamie are off to the high seas in a high class cruise ship. Jamie manages to come down off his drug dependency while he spends his vacation having nonstop threesome with 2 babes who hang on him like bark on a tree. Grenville also finds time to cheat on Louisa/Julia score with an older lady by the name of Leslie while on board. This leads to another quotable line:

"So Grenville," Jamie said conversationally, "yours give good head?"

Greetings from Commodore Cruise Line! Wish you were here. Love, Jamie.

Yep, Jamie/Willie & Grenville/Barnabas discussing oral sex. An area most fan fiction writers wouldn't even dare venture towards. But all good things must come to an end, including the boy's pleasure cruise & they return to Hawkes Harbor with Jamie greatly improved & more confident in himself. In time, he becomes a productive member of society, working odd jobs & donating his services to schools & charities.

The book then flashes forward 10 years where Jamie has become Harvey Lacey & lives a content comfortable life with his former captor. That Christmas, Grenville 'Last of the Big Time Spenders' Hawkins gives him a quilt. Jamie gets to enjoy it for exactly one night before a deer crashes into the car while he's driving Grenville home. He dies moments later & meets Kellen/Jason in heaven. Kellen claims that Jamie's act of lighting a candle & saying a prayer, allowed him into a much less fiery accommodation in the afterlife, but personally I think he just had some dirt on God & blackmailed his way through the pearly gates. The two sail off into the sunset of the great beyond. The End.

So that's the book. It has its pros & its cons, but it actually might have been much better if released as originally written, with the characters' names, places & events as we know them still intact. If you are familiar with Dark Shadows, it's impossible not to associate the book with it & become annoyed with some of the changes. While if you're NOT acquainted with the show, you're very likely to read the novel not being completely clear of the characters' personalities or motivations. It's really a no win situation.

In general, I like the way Jamie is written. But I think he's made out to be too much of a Gary Stu in some parts of the book. For one thing, Jamie is written as being primarily well liked by anyone he comes across, whereas this is certainly not the case for Willie. Early on, he insults & gets into fights with nearly anyone he meets. Jamie acts as an older brother towards Ricky & Trisha while Willie is mostly seen just throwing David's ass out of the Old House. The character of Katie is deeply fond of Jamie, going as far to name one of her sons after him. Regarding Maggie & Willie, early on she deeply despises him as he continually comes on to her, even when she makes it perfectly clear that she is not interested. After he is shot & she comes to believe in his innocence, her feeling towards him becomes one of friendship. But it's still more of a commiserative manner rather than romantic as Willie would like to believe. Often her interactions with him come off as if she's dealing with a child or slow minded adult.

And in turn, I think many of the secondary characters seem to have been made less likable, perhaps to make Jamie even more of the hero. The Hawkeses are described in brief as simply a family of rich snobs. Richard/Roger has to be taken to detox clinics, Barbara/Carolyn gets involved in one scandle after another. Granted the Collins themselves were far from perfect, but never near the level of arrogant highbrows as they are presented here as the Hawkeses.

Dr. Louisa Kahne is also written as a very flawed individual. In addition to being extremely controlling towards Jamie, it is mentioned by Dr. McDevitt that Louisa barely has any medical training or knowedge & yet goes around acting as a doctor. And while I'm not gonna defend Julia's treatment of Willie which ranges from small acts of kindness to being a complete bitch, I think it's unfair to quickly write her up as an unqualified quack. Her Doctor Feelgood reputation of passing out sedatives like Halloween candy precedes her, but Julia has been shown treating vampirism & creating an artifical person, & seems able to handle whatever injury or emergency is thrown at her on a daily basis.

But while we're on the subject of the Queen of Barbiturates, I do want to discuss a subject which I thought the book did well in covering. Which is in dealing with Jamie's health & mental state. On Dark Shadows, after Willie is shot enough times to kill a person two times over & regains consciousness from his coma, he is shown as being in a great amount of pain. And furthermore, he appears to have undergone a complete mental breakdown. Showing signs of amnesia (whether genuine or as a protective defense), he seems to have regressed to his state after being attacked by Barnabas, begging for it not to be dark & for no one to hurt him.

When we next see Willie a few months later at Wyncliffe, he claims to be physically strong as ever, but is still showing occasional signs of delusions, bad decisions, as well as sparks of his old mean demeanor that was repressed after being bitten. Miraculously, following his release, his mental state actually seems to improve over time, even while he is seen getting thrown into one dangerous situation after another. This I've always found hard to believe, especially considering Willie's parental caregivers rarely give him a thought of concern at all.

Willie: (After being forced to dig up a corpse & bring it back to the Old House) "You know, every time I touched it I felt sick. When I came back here I couldn't even go to sleep. I put it down here & I went to my room & I just lay there, Barnabas!" Barnabas: "Well, next time Julia will give you a sedative."

Yeah, I don't find it hard to picture Willie becoming dependent on painkillers & tranquilizers with his environment or the health problems that would come from 5 bullets in the back. But by this point, Willie mainly served as a background character, carrying out duties for Barnabas & Julia, with limited insight into his own personal life, or lack thereof. After all, what reason did the writers have to give his character a story arc of his own, when the viewers seemed content with watching Barnabas repeatedly pine on a lost love or mope over his vampire state?

But that's where its the viewer's job to watch, observe, read between the lines & ponder the untapped stories, feelings & adventures for characters who remain a mystery. And for that, despite some of the book's shortcomings, S.E. Hinton has done a respectable job in trying to make the reader better understand the character of Willie Loomis. Or Jamie Sommers, as she chooses to call him. Or if nothing else, I'm at least thankful that the author wanted to give Willie his moment in the spotlight.

#dark shadows #willie loomis #hawkes harbor

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