TIGER LILY, Jodi Lynn Anderson

When it comes to adapting Barrie’s story of a fantastic land where children never grow up, the aspect that just about everyone stumbles on is the portrayal of his Native American characters, who even in the original story suffer from the influences of colonialism and racism. Jodi Anderson attempts to not only tackle a new vision of Neverland’s native residents but put them in the spotlight as a culture and a collage of diverse characters. That doesn’t spare her from some deserved criticism of the stereotypes and caricatures she employs, as better dissected by Debbie Reese in her review of the book. Forgive my willingness to leave the problematic elements to the scrutiny of critics with a better grasp of the prevailing racial issues in Western literature that Tiger Lily reflects. I’ve honestly struggled to post this review out of fear that I wasn’t giving the Native American portrayals their due analysis, as my own knowledge on the subject is limited. For anyone interested, you can read Reese’s article here, and I recommend you do. I’ll mostly stick to assessing the story elements on the whole.

Character-wise, Tiger Lily (the protagonist) stands out as the most complex and interesting individual. I admit I enjoy the wild child trope, but in the context of a fictionalized Native American character it can be problematic. Yet Tiger’s awkward relationship with her community and her closer connection to nature, or with the equally wild Peter Pan, come across as organic to her personality. She struggles with her identity as a child, a girl, an outsider in her own village, and a native facing invasion of another culture. Her coming-of-age arc also stands apart from a lot of YA fiction thanks to the unusual setting in Neverland, where age is more relative. The emotional growth she undergoes is raw and honest, even in a magical world removed from our reality.

Anderson employs first-person narrative, but not from Tiger Lily’s perspective. Instead, Tinker Bell acts as the Nick Caraway equivalent, and then some. As a fairy no bigger than a firefly, Tink frequently follows Tiger around. Why? Isn’t Tink more interested in Peter Pan? Unlike her original counterpart, this Tinker Bell first develops a one-sided friendship with the protagonist, intrigued by Tiger’s mysterious origins, stoic exterior and layered soul. Her feelings for Peter come later and do temporarily meet at cross-purposes with her attachment to Tiger, but again, unlike the original Tink, her jealousy does not overwhelm her caring nature. Some fans of the petty and sometimes malicious fairy of Barrie’s creation might find Anderson’s version too soft; personally I enjoyed her insight into the various characters. I’m all about building characters, and while I appreciate that the spirit and general rules of Barrie’s universe are respected, a hardcore purist I am not.

Along with familiar faces from the story many people know, the novel introduces some new characters, mostly from Tiger Lily’s tribe. The most memorable are Tik Tok, Tiger’s adopted guardian, and Pine Sap, a disfigured boy who befriends her, if for no other reason than that they’re both pushed to the fringes of society by their strangeness. I honestly thought Tik Tok would somehow turn into the crocodile who takes Hook’s hand, but in fact he takes the name from the mechanism he found from a shipwreck. Despite being the respected shaman in the village, he is likewise an outsider for his eccentricities, the most prominent being his love of the foreign objects that wash up on shore from other lands and his fluid sexual identity. Gender is a struggle for Tiger, too, although more when she’s comparing herself with other girls such as Moon Eye, her one other friend, and eventually Wendy Darling. That Peter ends up rejecting Tiger in favor of Wendy’s more traditional femininity is painful to watch; even more devastating is what happens to Tik Tok when Philip, the Englishman Tiger Lily saves, turns the tribe against him. This too presents a problematic message, that even while Tik Tok garners sympathy, he’s doomed to a tragic end because of his unconventional identity, and there’s no other character in his predicament who lands a happy ending. The injustice will move you and may well remind you of the many times a queer character has been dispatched for the sake of drama or to address issues of intolerance. Such a message is important, but just as Anderson falls into the same traps as many writers addressing racism without fully exploring or expressing its devastating repercussions, she doesn’t attempt to change the typical narrative of queer characters even as she engages their pathos.

There’s marginal room for forgiveness, in my view, due to this being a YA novel. It’s hard to unpack these topics in a way that won’t overwhelm young people who picked up Tiger Lily out of fondness for the book, the play, or the movies they grew up loving. That said, writers in the genre should be willing to push boundaries and bring these heavy issues to young readers’ attention in a context they can relate to. In fantasy especially, that’s a tall but not unfulfillable order. I still think Anderson’s work is worth a read through how it draws you into its vivid characters, lush world and heartfelt voice—so long as the flaws are recognized, too.

Rating: 3.5/5