Sidney Williams revisits Michael McDowell’s 1981 The Elementarys, a novel about blood, family and sand
I I guess that’s where I actually discovered Michael McDowell (1950-1999), author of the 1981 novel The elementalsvia a meteorological incident. I had seen the paperbacks which published his long novel Black water (1983) for a while when I bought the first used book at my favorite used bookstore. I bought a few more new ones at my local Waldenbooks, thinking I’d have them when I was ready to read them.
But in Louisiana, where I grew up, winter can sometimes bring weather surprises. Ice storms occasionally hit winters, not fun, fluffy snow events. It was torrential, brutal downpours of freezing rain that covered tree branches and pine needles and knocked out power lines. You would find yourself stuck at home for a while.
I picked up the first paperback, The flood, read with an oil lamp. I was drawn to McDowell’s awash Alabama as soon as I gave the book a chance and flipped through the volumes I had on hand as the family saga with a supernatural twinge unfolded.
I had an uncle by marriage from Alabama, so a lot of the family questions resonated because I had heard stories about his family.
Paperback edition of The Elementals, (Avon October 1981)
I wanted to go to Waldenbooks to get the next volume as soon as I finished everything I had on hand, which didn’t take long. I probably got the first four, so I had to make do The lifting, the house And The war. I needed to grasp Fortune And Rain to finish the story.
My father said that the roads were still too dangerous even if we had melted a little. I had to wait several more agonizing days before I could purchase the final chapters, but I will always remember this winter fondly despite the difficulties.
I never met McDowell, but I saw him on a panel sometime later at a World Fantasy Convention. I attended several as I worked to learn more about writers and writing. He was part of a panel moderated by Dennis Etchison.
McDowell was an Alabama man and he spoke with a southern speech, a little slower with longer vowels. The accents of the various Southern states are actually quite strong, and his was distinct.
As an introduction, he talked about the film he was working on. This is what would become Beetle juicebut like he said…
“It’s the uv ah stooory family moving to rural Vermont…”
“And I bet something bad is coming,” Etchison injected into his clear and rapid speech in Cali.
It made even McDowell laugh, and it stuck with me. I was definitely in line to see Beetle juice when he opened it, delighted to discover that it was more than just a haunted house story.
This kind of gives you an idea of McDowell’s place in my reading life and in my formative experiences. On the other hand, it was my MFA long before I enrolled in a graduate course.
And as a reader, I went chasing the excitement of Black water. This meant returning to a book that was probably a set-up for Black water.
The elementals (October 1981) creates its own world of horrors, and it comes close to capturing the same Southern Gothic magic found in the longer saga.
It takes place mostly on the Alabama coast, and that appealed to me because, while my uncle was from Atmore, he had stories about Mobile and other areas along the white sand beaches of the Gulf.
Sand is important in The elementals as we meet the mixed-up Savage and McCray families at the funeral of matriarch Marian Savage. McDowell introduces key characters with mentions of family members like Big Barbara McCray. (My uncle often talked about an aunt in his family known as Big Momma, so this stuck out to me.)
Family members also include Big Barbara’s son Luker McCray and young daughter India. They lived elsewhere and returned with Luker’s marriage in the rearview mirror. They are family but with an urban background, they just have a slightly more foreign point of view.
Strangely, at the funeral, the Savages produce a box with a glowing knife inside which is plunged into Marian’s heart before the pallbearers enter to carry the coffin to the edge of the grave. It is an introduction to the strange supernatural history and the secrets that lurk alongside families.
Eventually, the family groups, including Luker and India, head to Beldame, the family getaway where there are three old houses, including one that has been gradually taken over by sand. The batteries passed through cracks and openings and infiltrated the chambers.
The cover on The elementals really seems like the inverse of the Dead White cover.
India begins snooping around the abandoned house, noticing a strange phenomenon through the windows, and the reader comes to understand that the Elementals are incarnations of sand, capable of killing and able to take the imperfect form of humans. McDowell really makes the land around the old Victorian houses real.
Odessa, the governess has a little knowledge of folklore and can offer a little help in warding off the dangers of the sand’s presence, but it is not enough to completely overcome these strange abilities.
As members of a family fall, it becomes clear that anyone can die, and the Elementals grow in power. They become more threatening and Luker and India realize they must act. But how can they stop the strange presence that has tormented their family for generations?
The elementals is strange, atmospheric and totally captivating. McDowell may have only aspired to tell a good story, but using his knowledge of Alabama and its surrounding areas as well as Southern families, he created an authentic, layered, textured drama with families as important as those of Blackwater.
It’s about 290 pages long, but it feels bulky and qualifies as what we sometimes call today high horror, but it never sacrifices unsettling suspense or mounting terror.
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