The theme
of the book is that, except for Indigenous Peoples, all Canadians are the
descendants of immigrants who came to the country seeking refuge and hoping for
a better life. The epigraph is a Martin Luther King quotation: “We may have all come on different ships, but
we’re in the same boat now.” All the major
characters are refugees or the children of immigrants. Grace, for example, tells her daughters, “If
your great-grandfather hadn’t gotten on that ship a century ago, none of us would
be here” (106). The problem is that
people forget that their ancestors were like Mahindan; Grace’s mother points
out that Grace is in danger of repeating racist actions of the past: “Certain people felt too rooted, too
comfortable. They took it for granted
that they deserved to be here more than us.
Entitlement closed their hearts” (275).
Mahindan is
a very nuanced character. He, like all
the refugees on the ship, is considered the enemy until he can prove that he is
innocent and so worthy of protection.
The problem is that he did work for the Tamil Tigers whom the Canadian
government has designated a terrorist group.
As a mechanic, he worked on vehicles for the Tigers because he had no
choice: “If I had refused, [the Tiger
cadre] would have beaten me. If I had
refused again, he would have killed me. . . . My wife was pregnant at the time.
. . . With my son. The cadre would have set
fire to our house, allowed my wife to burn inside” (198). To get himself and his son to safety, he had
to do things that went against his morals, but he was desperate.
Mahindan
may not be innocent, but Priya’s situation emphasizes that no one is. She ends up learning about some hidden family
history which shows that members of her own family had made choices like
Mahindan’s. Priya’s uncle says, “Priya,
what do you think happens when you terrorize a people, force them to flee, take
away their options, then put them in a cage all together? Will they not try and break down the bars? .
. . It is very convenient, no? These
labels. Terrorist” (230).
Grace is
the weakest character because she is used by the author, rather heavy-handedly,
to make a political statement. Grace is
appointed by Blair, a cabinet minister, and is ill-equipped for her
position. An immigration lawyer
describes people like Grace: “Half those
adjudicators are patronage appointments.
Do you think they’ve studied the Act?
Done their due diligence? Or do
you think they just let Blair drip his poison in their ears? Illegals. Snakeheads. Terrorists. You scare people stupid and then you pull
their strings” (119). At the beginning,
Grace comes across as very unfeeling. When
Mahindan is separated from his son, Grace thinks, “of all the times she had
spent working late or away at conferences when the girls were small. These little absences were only short
chapters in long parent-child histories” (90).
Blair, her boss, seems as clueless:
“We have to encourage people to go through the proper channels and not
just jump on the first boat that sails into the harbour” (339). Initially, Grace seems to have difficulty
seeing connections between her actions and those of government officials who
during World War II designated her family as enemy aliens. Fortunately, later she questions her superior
so there is hope that Mahindan’s admissibility hearing might have a positive
outcome.
The book
really does show the complex situation in which refugees find themselves. They flee horrific situations and are often take
desperate measures to find a safe haven.
Even if they do make it to supposedly safe shores, they face a long process
of reviews and hearings. Though the book
was quickly eliminated from Canada Reads 2018, I do think that the book is one
that can open people’s eyes.
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