They Threw Us Away
by Daniel Kraus
Holt Books/MacMillan, 2020
256 Pages
Ages 10-14
This is a mid-grade action adventure that happens to have teddy bears as protagonists. I’d have to shelve it next to Robin Jarvis’ Deptford Mice; it’s cute, but it has some dark corners that keep the journey from being too easy. It demands personal introspection and challenges the reader’s spirit.
I felt trepidation at the idea of reading a Daniel Kraus book to my daughter. While The Shape of Water was sweet, his mind has produced some pretty twisted stuff. I had heard the term “I broke out in a cold sweat,” but never really experienced it as a thing until I read Scowler. And let’s just say the vagueness at the end of Blood Sugar was probably worse than if he had actually described what I think happened. Despite a few deaths along the way, and some scenes that made our guts clench, the story was just right for a 12 year old with a warped sense of humor.
They Threw Us Away is strictly Kraus’ writing voice; something I gravitated to in Rotters and Scowler, but that seemed diluted in his Guillermo del Toro collaborations like Trollhunters. (Though I’d love to see Kraus pen a Pacific Rim story!)
Thaumaturgy
The working of wonders or miracles; magic.
Five teddy bears awake and face a vast expanse of trash as far as the glass-, well, plastic eye can see. They are unique, custom Furrington Teddies, stuffed bears, each with a name sewn to them:
Buddy, The blue-furred leader; Sunny, the tough yellow bear who has a hot temper, but is also very much a leader; Horace, whose fur is gray, is the oldest of them, who tells stories about the Mother and a first bear named “Proto,” their creation myth. There is green Reginald who is nibbled by ants from a pizza box in the first scene; and Sugar is a pink bear whose box reads “damaged goods” and behaves accordingly but offers prophetic insight. As they travel, they meet more teddies… and lose some along the way, as they learn who they are and where they came from, searching for the answer to the overarching mystery: why were they all thrown away?
The Furrington Teddies™ must try to survive the dangers of The Haze, from bulldozers to rats and seagulls while melted teddy bear boxes warn that someone out there “doesn’t like them.” Bears die, picked off by gulls or sacrificing themselves for the safety of the others, but Kraus doesn’t dwell on it. They must find a way back to the toy store so they can fulfill each of their destinies, to find a child and achieve the state of “forever sleep.” A comforting voice speaks to Buddy in moments of danger. But where does it come from?
They meet Pookie, a red-plush Frankenstein bear with a fork for a leg, who has been living in the dump for some time and has “seen it all and more.” She sends the family of bears on their quest, pointing them to a place where there are children, across the danger-saturated urban landscape, far for teddies’ small legs to carry them. She also imparts a warning. If they reach the toy store, will it offer the answers they seek? When they find a child, will it even matter?
“Run,” the gray teddy insisted.
Buddy stomped a foot into the chewing gum so he was stuck too.
“We started together,” Buddy said. “We’ll end together.”
Reginald nodded, like he’d anticipated this reply.
They embraced tightly as two teddies could, and the garbage truck ran over them.
The world went tornado black.
At the end of the line, an abomination will demand a sacrifice.
Black and white illustrations by Rovina Cai accentuate the tumultuous journey, adding flavor to its dark edge.
Behind these bears are existential implications that we can reflect upon universally. What is death, or “forever sleep”? Is it possible to embrace adulthood un-scarred? Is there a voice watching over us from some unseen place?
I often ruminate over what “horror” for children really is. The media refer to it as “mystery”. Is it the gothic, dark old haunted house atmosphere? Is it confronting the fear of the loss of loved ones, abandonment, or persecution? The supernatural is part-and-parcel of juvenile dark fantasy, but its subtext is more about that pervasive underlying terror of the undefined soul-rending pain that waits in the darkness of the closet, or under the bed, or just beyond the whispering trees.
What terrors might our experience bring, undeserved, unbidden, that we need to prepare ourselves for as we grow and travel through life? Kraus revels in its unveiling. He manages to maintain a level of innocence that will prevent younger audiences from lying awake at night, yet still provide twisted, intense scenes that will make this journey unforgettable.
I shall never forget the true, magical meaning of the trademark symbol for as long as I live.
Related Posts (by Daniel Kraus):
The Monster Variations
Rotters
Scowler
Trollhunters
