Author Craig Davidson gets gritty again, this time with novel ‘Cataract City’

TORONTO – When Toronto-based author Craig Davidson showed up for a recent interview with a mild shiner and stitches above his left eyebrow, it seemed a more fitting than frightening sight.

After all, the 37-year-old is known for writing about brutal bouts in books, including the short story collection “Rust and Bone,” which was made into a 2012 Golden Globe-nominated film starring Oscar winner Marion Cotillard, and the novel “The Fighter,” for which he took steroids as part of his research and participated in a promotional boxing match.

With his new novel, “Cataract City,” he cast his imagination to the blood and gore of underground fighting once again as he wrote a compelling and witty coming-of-age tale of two friends who get caught up in the seedy underbelly of Niagara Falls, Ont.

Davidson says he has a scrappy past of playground fights and bar brawls, but his most recent facial injuries were due to an elbow that cracked his forehead during a harmless game of pickup basketball.

“It seems to go part and parcel with the book,” he said with a laugh. “So it’s OK to have some stitches bristling up there now.”

Basketball is also the favourite sport of one of two protagonists in “Cataract City,” a Doubleday Canada publication on sale now.

Owen (Dutch) Stuckey is the dear dribbling friend of Duncan (Dunk) Diggs, with whom he grew up on the same street in the blue-collar city. Both their dads also worked at the local Nabisco factory (a.k.a. The Bisk), only Owen’s father had a higher position.

The two go through a harrowing experience as kids when their local wrestling idol, Bruiser Mahoney, takes them into the woods for a night of camping.

As they grow older, Owen shows a natural ability to shoot hoops, but a tragedy strips away his dreams of being a basketball star and he becomes a cop.

Duncan, meanwhile, becomes involved in dog racing, underground fighting and cigarette smuggling with the abhorrent Lemmy Drinkwater. After a stint in jail, Duncan returns to the city and gets sucked back into its gritty corners.

Despite the dark content, the sharply written novel is punctuated with much humour, especially at the beginning with the boys’ banter and ’80s lingo/pop-culture references.

Davidson said the relationship between Duncan and Owen was inspired by a close friendship he developed with a co-worker named Matt during a summer job as a teen at Marineland in Niagara Falls. Davidson lived in St. Catharines, Ont., but Matt lived in the Niagara Falls community of Chippawa.

“Matt … physically, and in a lot of ways that he goes through his life at the time that I knew him, became the Duncan character, and I saw myself most as Owen, who is sort of the more privileged guy from a more middle-class upbringing and didn’t have to strive as hard.”

Davidson describes Duncan’s fighting matches with a great sense of realism.

He said he’s able to do so because he’s had “a lot” of experience exchanging punches both inside and outside a boxing ring.

“I was the guy who would get into a fight with you,” said Davidson. “I’d get upset if you were insulting me or insulting my friend or my brother, or you’re doing something against someone that I care about, and I’d rise to action.”

“But it’s like a man with no weapons going into a fight,” he continued with a laugh, calling himself “a pretty easy target” because he’s not a heavyweight.

His last fight was probably in his late 20s.

“And I lost again, and I thought, ‘Craig, there are better ways to just either let it go or find another way, because you’re just not good at this.'”

Between this novel and his others, one might get a sense that Davidson has been to some dark corners of this world.

But the father of a one-year-old insisted that’s not the case.

“There’s been no voyages in Cambodia where I’m sitting side by side with drug dealers and doing any of that,” he said with a laugh.

“I’ve gotten that a lot, too, especially like, ‘Oh, you’re not who I thought you were.'”

Davidson said some readers have also asked “Why can’t you just write a happy story, a happy book?'”

His answer is that he doesn’t think that’s a fair representation of the world.

Besides, in between the bleakness of his books are fleeting moments of hope, grace and nobility, he added.

“If I could be less reserved and dole out great gobs of happiness for all of my characters, I probably would. Probably the (publishers) would be like, ‘Yes, please do that more often, because maybe your books would sell better,'” said Davidson, who writes for various publications and pens horror fiction under a pseudonym.

“But it’s like you’ve got the tools that got you into the game and this is what you’ve got and this is the way that you see the world. I’m not saying I won’t change and things won’t change. I might be 70 and sort of losing my mind and then I’ll be putting out the most happy, sunny, wonderful books ever, if I’m still writing.

“But I think some people say that to you and you sort of say, ‘Well, it really is like a leopard changing his or her spots.'”