Bite the Stars

by Eliza Clark

Bite the Stars marks the U.S. debut of the Canadian author, Eliza Clark. Bite the Stars opens with a tornado that whips into motion the whirlwind events of a young woman's life.
Grace Larson tells the gripping story of the storm that caused her to go into labor prematurely and give birth to Cole, who becomes as menacing and dangerous as the force of nature out of which he was born.
While her son is on the run from the law, ravaging his own path of wild destruction, Grace reads books and studies facts of nature - the chemistry of fireflies, blazing trails of dying comets, ultraviolet visions of butterflies - looking for clues to her son's character. She searches her memory for events in their past to figure out why Cole is the way he is, where nurture ends and nature rules.

256 pages, Paperback

First published December 31, 1999

About the author

Eliza Clark is a Canadian writer.

Born in Toronto, Ontario, she received a Bachelor of Fine Arts from York University in 1985. She now works steadily as a television producer/director, fiction writer and story editor for both text and film. Clark has also taught creative writing at Ryerson University, the Humber School for Writers and York University.

Reviews

[Yvonne Blackwood · Rating 3 out of 5]

A story about a mother's love for her child even when she realizes that he is bad from the inside. Can she blame the fact that he was born during a tornado when the roof of a church fell and crushed to death sixteen little children or that his father was a married man with a family, or that she had given him to her stable sister to take care of for two years when he was only two? Whatever the reason for the son's bad behaviour, overlooking it proved disastrous. Clark captures the atmosphere of the USA south, but the story jumps around too much.

[cindy townley · Rating 3 out of 5]

It was okay. Very real and raw. Mother's story about how her son got on Death's row. Sad.

[Lara Samulenok · Rating 3 out of 5]

An interesting style where present, past, and future are blurred; the way she blends memories together seamlessly with no real defined timeline.

[Derek]

Eliza was my creative writing prof for half a term, so it was neat to see where she was coming from. It's a sad book, but it has a real strong heartbeat to it. I'm glad to have had the opportunity to learn from her.

[David Robbeson]

I was actually paid to review this book. Peh-ew!