Wrecker by Summer Wood

He seemed to need to feel his body collide with the physical world to know he existed. – Wrecker

The child came into the world in a San Francisco city park, born to an unmarried hippie mother who didn’t even bother naming him for a year. When the boy shows a talent, even at such a young age, for being disruptive and getting into things he shouldn’t his mother, Lisa Fay, finally decides on a name for him: Wrecker. With a start like that, it’s no wonder life ends up being an uphill battle for the boy.

Unprepared for dealing with a child, especially after Wrecker’s father exists stage left, Lisa gets caught up in drugs, eventually leading to her involvement in a crime that lands her in prison looking at a 30 year stretch. So, at the ripe old age of three Wrecker enters the California foster care system, bouncing around a bit until his uncle, Len, is located in the Mattole River Valley of Humboldt County in upstate California and agrees to take the boy in.

Already caring for a wife debilitated by the effects of an infection that attacked her brain, Len quickly realizes he is in no position to keep up with Wrecker. Enter the residents of Bow Farm, a small community of four individuals who live just up the road from Len. Used to chipping in to help Len care for his wife, they agree to temporarily take in Wrecker until Len can arrange to take him back to child welfare in San Francisco. Temporarily turns into seventeen years, as we follow Wrecker from age three to twenty and watch how the ragtag Bow Farm community helps shape him into a strong young man, and how he brings them all together in a way they couldn’t possibly have foreseen when they first agreed to watch the wild child known as Wrecker.

I went into this book a little skeptical, the peace-love-harmony vibe of the 60’s not really being my cup of tea. Add to that a plot that revolves around foster care, something I have no experience with directly or indirectly, and one may wonder why I even bothered. Chalk that up to Lisa at TLC who seems to be particularly skilled at luring me out of my comfort zone, and once again she didn’t lead me astray.

Though the book begins in the late 60’s and unfolds in the mini commune setting of Bow Farm, I never got the stereotypical “hippie” vibe while reading Wrecker. Instead, through author Summer Wood’s beautifully understated prose I came to know and genuinely care about each of the people who came to make up Wrecker’s unusual family. Each arrived at Bow Farm with their own particular baggage and blind spots but, along with Len, they close ranks around Wrecker, coming together to form not just a community of people living together, but a genuine family dedicated to raising their collective child.

And then, of course, there is Wrecker himself. Determined when he first arrives not to conform to the demands adults place upon him, Wrecker slowly comes to realize the Bow Farm community isn’t really “demanding” anything; they don’t want to control him, but neither will they let the “wild child” control them. A détente of sorts quickly springs up, one that over time thaws into genuine love and respect. Wood’s exploration of Wrecker’s development from an angry, confused, withdrawn child to that of a strong, quietly confident young man is thoroughly engaging, yet amazingly subtle. Quite simply, Wrecker is the magical story of a child named for destruction, who grows up to create something incredibly special.

Wrecker is available from Bloomsbury (ISBN: 978-1608192809).

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