Invisible Prisons: Jack Whalen’s Tireless Fight For Justice
by Lisa Moore and Jack Whelan
Penguin Randomhouse
Available at the Riddle Fence Book Store, 100 Duckworth, Saturdays 10-6 | $35.95
Reviewed by Maggie Burton
Invisible Prisons is a book in five sections plus a preface and an epilogue. It is a book that tries, and succeeds, to be a lot of different things. It is a triumphant account of human survival against the odds, the odds in this case being cruel mistreatment and abuse at the hands of church and state. It is a book that chronicles how trauma haunts a person, such as Jack’s recurring nightmares of rats crawling over his young body as he hid from the authorities in the battery. The Invisible Prison represents the mental torture of being thrown right back into the cell where Jack experienced recurring solitary confinement. Moore and Whelan force the reader to confront the trauma directly, the abuse, the cruelty, wisely knowing that to bear witness to evil is to take away some of its power.
Ultimately, one main arc of the book explores the love and care of one family for anyone lucky enough to be their kin. At the St. John’s launch of Invisible Prisons, four of Jack’s siblings were in attendance. They all stood, proudly, to be recognized as such.
It’s in the first section where the reader gets to know Jack Whalen’s family and the community around them. Jack is both fiercely protective of his younger brothers, and is fiercely loved and cared for by his mother and older sisters. He is a handful, but he is loved. He is a sweet little boy.
When asked about their writing process at the launch of Invisible Prisons, Moore and Whelan described a relationship built on trust and openness. Moore would read a section over a call with Whelan, and ask if she got it right, or if adjustments had to be made. Sometimes, Whelan’s wife, Glennis, would encourage him to make sure Moore authentically captured a particular image. Readers of Lisa Moore’s fiction will recognize the author’s unique descriptive style, which has only been further elevated by Jack’s memories of his childhood. “There was foam sliding down the side of the pot on the stove. Only when Debbie had turned it off did Jack realize that the lid had been hopping around on top of the saucepan, the boiling frantic. The lid banging like a drum.” There is a stark contrast between the environment at his mother’s house, with fresh bread giving rise to full bellies, with cheerful sounds of TV shows and the radio, and the deafening silence of the cell where Jack spent much of his four years at the Whitbourne. As the reader is confronted with the myriad horrors of the institution, one feels the agony experienced by Jack and his family as they are separated. One wishes for their reunification above all else.
My own son is named Jack and he is twelve years old, about the same age Jack Whalen was while he was starting his journey through the system. Reading this account of another little boy named Jack who was so loved by his family, yet they were powerless to stop what was happening to him, was devastating. Throughout the book, one cries for Jack, admires his courage, laughs at his antics, and roots for his successful escape every time he leaves on foot to flee from the Whitbourne. One witnesses and experiences the injustice of the system that was supposed to help Jack and his family, perhaps best depicted as Jack realizes “[t]he lesson was an absurdity–obdurate, inarguable, profound. The lesson was that there was no lesson”. The Whitbourne closed in 1992 when I was one year old, when another correctional facility for young offenders opened in its place. As a child, my male classmates were threatened with being sent “to the Whitbourne” all the time by our teachers. The very name of the town was synonymous with horror for us as we wondered what really happened to the boys who were sent there.
One of the hopes Jack has for this book is that no child should be subject to the treatment he experienced, especially solitary confinement, ever again. At the time of writing this, solitary confinement is a measure that continues to be used for youth in institutions, even as it has been shown not to be effective for disciplinary purposes. The book, to me, represents an open door to discussing the practice of state-sanctioned solitary confinement across Canada, whether it’s in the world of corrections, or in hospitals, or in other institutions.
Invisible Prisons is a powerful account of a life lived with courage and conviction, of the redemptive nature of love and family and community. I hope their story inspires more people who have suffered abuse at the hands of the state to come forward.
Maggie Burton is a Newfoundland writer, violinist, and municipal politician. Her debut book of poetry, Chores, won the 2024 Griffin Canadian First Book Prize and was shortlisted for the Gerald Lampert Memorial Award. Her work has appeared in Prism, The Malahat Review, Riddle Fence, Room, Best Canadian Poetry, and elsewhere.
November, 2024