Fishboy

by Mark Richard

Fishboy is a throw-away boy, a boy abandoned and reborn in a swamp by the side of a road, who, fleeing the consequences of a murder he believes he has committed, jumps a trawler manned by a crew of renegades. On a voyage replete with ghosts, sea creatures, and the constant threat of dissolution, Fishboy yearns to expiate his guilt by serving his violent shipmates: the captain, a giant called John whose entire body is a cartographical tattoo; the repulsive but wise steersman Mr. Watt, the man turned inside out; the homicidal, knife-wielding Lonny; the boil-plagued cook, haunted by his armless brother.