fallout shelter, a novel by steven schindler
reviewed by ny based book reviewer malia lee
Headline: Review:
“Fallout Shelter” explores pederasty in Catholic schools through the eyes of the young men who attend them
Steven Schindler’s latest book uncovers the toxic masculinity and cycle of abuse experienced by a group of teenage boys in 1970s South Bronx Catholic schools
By: Malia Lee
Content warning: This article contains descriptions of sexual abuse.
Steven Schindler is a coming-of-age novelist whose work spans back to the late 1990s with his breakout novel “Sewer Balls”. His work centers around young men growing up in the Bronx–Schindler’s birthplace– and the intense bonds formed between them as they are brought together by their eclectic neighborhoods. With a few exceptions throughout his career in publications, like “From Here to Reality” and “What's Good for the Girls”, Schindler utilizes his strength of childhood nostalgia to invite readers into highly detailed, fictionalized portraits of the Bronx. With his latest book “Fallout Shelter”, Schindler doesn’t stray from this tradition as he recounts the journey of a group of young boys in the Catholic education system of the 1970s South Bronx. This time, however, amongst his well-versed description of maturing teenagers, a darkened narrative centering on young men growing up in a system where abuse, neglect, and acquiescence are the norm eclipses any banality this book might first appear to be.
In “Fallout Shelter”, Schindler vividly describes the transition from childhood to adulthood, accounting for the various experiences of his young characters, much of which consist of their erotic ventures. For most past the age of pubescents, the idea of reading a book describing the journey of a group of boys as they explore grimy New York strip clubs, watching dancers press themselves into cages as they brag about the inability to control their dicks, does not make for an appealing beginning. Yet, this is what the first sixty pages of Steven Schindler’s latest book “Fallout Shelter” provide, threatening to be just another story in which horny characters – and a probable horny writer – get to live out their sexual fantasies for the “enjoyment of the reader”. But boys acting out due to sexual frustration in their repressive environment is vital to the theme that takes shape around the denial of physical assault and the suppression of their urges. To minimize the experiences of Chili, Angel, Jamie, or any of Schindler’s other young characters would be a mistake.
“Fallout Shelter” immediately pulls the reader from the start, with a scene in which an eighth-grade class is practicing for an emergency drill. The dark hallway is lined with overly-excited students watched over by the tyrannical nuns who teach them. As Chili Manzilla–Schindler’s main character–walks down the hallway, he suddenly points his flashlight at the chests of his various female classmates as friends rally him on. It was this kind of juvenile brutishness that was most disarming at first because oftentimes it can feel extraneous to the main storyline or worse, like an attempt to mimic classic coming-of-age novels like “Catcher in the Rye” or “The Outsiders” but falling short with the emotional resonance to make up for the characters’ idiotic actions. But
Schindler’s dedication to the creation of fully formed characters throughout the novel proves time and after time the necessity of this kind of indirect discourse by the narrator. Over-the-top references to each boy’s “manly mound” and a good number of epithets regarding female anatomy such as “newly sprouted breasties” will have to be persevered by the reader for full immersion into the world that Schindler has so intricately developed.
In 1970s South Bronx, Schindler describes the home of his main characters as a neighborhood where “putrid filth” covers the streets and low-life criminals are ready to prey upon “the weak, the unsuspecting.” Here, Catholic high schools represent a safe haven. They’re also seen as the epitome of higher education, a symbol of wealth for those who can afford to get in. They’re a chance to escape from a life of manual labor and go on to find opportunities in a safer burrow, that's at least the pretense that parents like Chili’s hope in return for their exuberant tuition. They’re a place where boys are taught through a strict form of physical regulation and Catholic ethical ideologies.
Schindler does an excellent job of foreshadowing the extreme abuse of power by bishops and priests seen later on, introducing the readers to an environment in which acts of violence are seen as convenient ways to teach. It's in one of these Catholic high schools that Chili ends up in along with his younger sibling Jamie. Chili represents a “model young Catholic boy”— hard-working, with good grades, and with a desire to go into the seminary after graduating. But during his years of rigorous education, a life of turmoil occurs in the background.
In Chili, the reader sees a kid struggling to figure out what to believe in. At school, Chili is instilled with hyper masculine ideals of strength, coldness, and sexual power. Through this absolutism, however, Chili’s childlike innocence is revealed as he struggles with an intrinsic morality, the root of which is his mother’s everlasting memory. He grapples with the loss of his mother from a young age, his only recollection of compassion and love, the only one who called him his real name: William. Without this guidance, Chili alone is forced to deal with his drunk father and is forced into a position as a parental figure to Jamie. On top of all of this, Chili has a complicated relationship with Catholicism as it appears to have been relied upon more as an abatement from daily struggle rather than something freely believed in.
Schindler cleverly delves deeper into the lack of choice Chili has from the start by giving more insight into why he has always felt such a blind compulsion towards the Church. From a young age, Catholicism has been ingrained into his life through education and by his devout mother’s wish for him to join the Church. He grew up being told to “look for signs”, a command Chili not so unconsciously follows all the way to seminary school. But this question surrounding Catholicism, if it's a choice or just a preordained lifestyle, is heightened when rumors of crimes committed by priests and archbishops of the Bronx diocese start to circulate. A tension grows just as Chili questions the righteousness of his own choices and he fears that the church might be neglecting the consent of his peers altogether.
Schindler recreates a world so often revealed as the underbelly of Catholic institutions in which rape, more specifically “pederasty” is a constant. Similar to real-life exposes, like the Boston Globe’s 2002 article, in which it was revealed that priests throughout the Boston diocese had been molesting children for decades, Schindler slowly unwraps the truth of the Bronx’s own cycle of abuse and quieting of minors filed in from Catholic schools.
One could be confused as the book shifts from focusing on an overwhelmed boy, struggling with inane difficulties like family obligations and interacting with women to the shocking revelation of the abuse of students. Still, the cultural theme which enforces toxic masculinity on young boys and degrades men who dare to tell the truth is held throughout, creating a unified piece that examines these antiquated standards of the 20th century. Schindler's deeply empathetic character creation and his lucid recreation of 1970s Bronx makes for a truly captivating read.
