I recently read the novel Tenderness by Robert Cormier. This book set a very dark and dreary tone and maintained it well throughout the book. This was quite the contrast from the John Green book that we read for my Young Adult Literature class because that was written rather cheery and sarcastically joyful. The main character in this book is really two people: Eric Poole an 18 year old kid who is just now getting out of a juvenile detention center that he has been in for the last three or so years for killing his mother and his step father. The second main character is Lori, she is a fifteen year old girl who has a weird habit of becoming easily fixated with people and Eric is her most recent victim of fixation. The book centers around these two and their similarly desolate and opressed lives and how they come together and arguably fall in love with one another.
The plot for this book is very impressive and it is a very plot driven book which I typically do not like. However, Cormier has a way of making the plot interesting by switching the focus of characters back and forth between who is talking at the time. Lori is a chronically notorious run away and one day when she ran away she saw Eric and a girl walking down some train tracks. She assumes the girl is Eric's girlfriend, however, at the time she did not know who Eric was because he was not in the public eye for being a murderer. She later sees Eric alone (she later comes to find out that he killed her in the woods) and he is very nice to her. He almost assumes a fatherly role towards her when a gang of bikers approach and begin to harass her. Three years later when Eric is released from the "facility" she sees him on the television and is fixated on him again. Eric is staying with his aunt at the time and decides to go for a drive only to find out that Lori snuck into his van. He is worried and decides that he needs to kill her because they talk and he finds out that she was a witness to him pre-murder years ago for a crime for which he was not yet convicted and probably never would be as long as she kept quiet. Eric and her have a nice evening together going shopping, eating dinner and just talking. Later in the hotel room he tries to snuff her with a pillow. He decides against it and she confesses her love to him. The next day Eric is going to meet a girl that he met in jail and finds out via. Lori that it is a scam set up by the tenacious detective. Lori and Eric go canoeing together later and Lori hits her head and drowns. Naturally the detective assumes that he murdered her and he goes back to jail where he finally gets in touch with his human emotion by crying.
I think this book is not so great of a learning tool for young adults but that does not take away from the fact that it is still a great and very entertaining book. The themes I felt were too obvioius but weakly displayed. Clearly due to the title both Eric and Lori were seeking tenderness which they finally found together. I feel like desperation and solitude were some key themes in this book. Overall this book was a great plot centered book, not great literature by any means but I am very glad I read it and would like to read more of Robert Cormier's works.
Wednesday, September 23, 2009
Sunday, September 13, 2009
YA(Y) for Class!
The young adult literature class focuses, or seems to thus far, soley on writings by young adults and for young adults. The first thing that I thought when signing up for this class was that we were going to read and review books similar to "Catcher in the Rye," and I was not entirely wrong because so far that book has come up in discussions and articles and blogs everywhere I look, it seems to truly epitomize young adult literature.
I like that the field of young adult literature itself is controversial and mostly because no one really knows what exactly young adult literature is. The articles that we have read in class so far have been very useful and I have referred back to most of them several times during the course of the class and especially during discussions. The central them of most of these articles seems to by the underlying question of what exactly is adult literature? Most of the books that have been presented as options to our class, and all of the books that I have read in class seem to have central themes around young adults and there attempt to find their inner voice.
I was however, dissapointed in some of the criteria that excludes certain books from that category. A student brought up during class one day that she wouldn't mind reading a young adult literature book written from the perspective of an adult looking back. I think that is a great point because it is a very common thing that kids need guidance and love and a realization that someone has been through and survived their struggles or similar ones. Also it would seem important that this adult have no self-interest in any particular child because self interest seems to breed false motives and a general distrust that is often initiated by adults onto children. Afterall we all have to be children before we can be adults.
I like that the field of young adult literature itself is controversial and mostly because no one really knows what exactly young adult literature is. The articles that we have read in class so far have been very useful and I have referred back to most of them several times during the course of the class and especially during discussions. The central them of most of these articles seems to by the underlying question of what exactly is adult literature? Most of the books that have been presented as options to our class, and all of the books that I have read in class seem to have central themes around young adults and there attempt to find their inner voice.
I was however, dissapointed in some of the criteria that excludes certain books from that category. A student brought up during class one day that she wouldn't mind reading a young adult literature book written from the perspective of an adult looking back. I think that is a great point because it is a very common thing that kids need guidance and love and a realization that someone has been through and survived their struggles or similar ones. Also it would seem important that this adult have no self-interest in any particular child because self interest seems to breed false motives and a general distrust that is often initiated by adults onto children. Afterall we all have to be children before we can be adults.
Curious Incident of the Dog in the night time.
When I first read this book I was skeptical of it because I thought it lacked any kind of depth. My main complaints were about its simplistic style of writing and childish story line. I am more into literature myself than into actualy stories in books, (as it can be noted my favorite books involve little plot) and I felt that this book in particular had too much of a story line with not enough delivery of literature to back up the plot.
In my young adult literature class we discussed in small groups, all the books that we read for the previous week. When I discussed this book with my friends in the class and told them about my feelings on the book they all seemed to have similar reactions. They mostly said that since the book was written in the perspective of a boy with mild autism (possibly aspergers syndrome) it would be hard for a younger child reading the book to grasp that concept, where as adults or, college students for that matter could better humor the boy about his style of writing and his different perspective on life.
After we discussed this in our small groups I really changed my perspective on the book in a positive way. I realized that although this book was seemingly childish, that in reality that made for beautiful literature as if from the direct perspective of the narrator. This is a very talented way of writing that I would not have appreciated as much if I didn't hear an alternative perspective from my group members.
This book is about a boy who has some form of a learning disability (although it is never directly stated he seems to have qualities of autism such as: a desire for repitition, logic based on very particular things like seeing five cars yellow equals a bad day or vise versa) that finds his neighbors dog murdered. He goes on a long adventure across a city in England to find the killer. He later discovers it was his father and that his mother whom which he thought was dead was really only moved away becuase of an affair that she had with the neigbor. The book was action packed and very interesting from this boys perspective.
In my young adult literature class we discussed in small groups, all the books that we read for the previous week. When I discussed this book with my friends in the class and told them about my feelings on the book they all seemed to have similar reactions. They mostly said that since the book was written in the perspective of a boy with mild autism (possibly aspergers syndrome) it would be hard for a younger child reading the book to grasp that concept, where as adults or, college students for that matter could better humor the boy about his style of writing and his different perspective on life.
After we discussed this in our small groups I really changed my perspective on the book in a positive way. I realized that although this book was seemingly childish, that in reality that made for beautiful literature as if from the direct perspective of the narrator. This is a very talented way of writing that I would not have appreciated as much if I didn't hear an alternative perspective from my group members.
This book is about a boy who has some form of a learning disability (although it is never directly stated he seems to have qualities of autism such as: a desire for repitition, logic based on very particular things like seeing five cars yellow equals a bad day or vise versa) that finds his neighbors dog murdered. He goes on a long adventure across a city in England to find the killer. He later discovers it was his father and that his mother whom which he thought was dead was really only moved away becuase of an affair that she had with the neigbor. The book was action packed and very interesting from this boys perspective.
Go ask Alice...who is Alice??
Go ask alice by....anonymous, right?? First of all I would like to say that if this book was really written by anonymous than...wow! First of all I would like to adress the controversies surrounding this book. (The ones that I have heard about) First of all I heard that the book was now really written by anonymous but that it was indeed written by a woman named Beatrice Sparks. However, I was never able to confirm this anywhere and most of the other blogs and readings on this book have suggested that it is still unknown so perhaps "anonymous" is a cheap way out of things.
Secondly I have heard atleast two different potential origins for the title of the book, "Go Ask Alice." I have heard that it was a random reference to a very minor character in the book named Alice who was a junkie on the street that the main character interacted very briefly with. Recently too I heard that the title was taken from a song from the 60's called "White Rabbit," by Jefferson Airplane. I can't find any evidence that this was true. And also, what initially popped into my head was the children's story about "Alice in Wonderland," also said to be somewhat of a psychedelic experience.
Another controversy surrounding this book is rooted in the field of education and the usefullness that this book provides. Quite simply this is opinion. My mother who read this book when she was younger felt that it served no purpose either way, negatively or positively. However I felt that this book scared me to death on certain parts and was somewhat of a horror story and I can only imagine that it would be a deterrent to drugs for most kids. There are alot of kids however, who may think that this is a cool lifestyle and be attracted to the idea of getting involved in that lifestyle. For me I would say that the book is not an important or necessary read but I also do not believe in banning ANY book for ANY reason, so I think it should be made available to all but not pushed. It is not extremely well written or deeply meaningful so I don't thing it is useful to English teachers for any one thing.
Secondly I have heard atleast two different potential origins for the title of the book, "Go Ask Alice." I have heard that it was a random reference to a very minor character in the book named Alice who was a junkie on the street that the main character interacted very briefly with. Recently too I heard that the title was taken from a song from the 60's called "White Rabbit," by Jefferson Airplane. I can't find any evidence that this was true. And also, what initially popped into my head was the children's story about "Alice in Wonderland," also said to be somewhat of a psychedelic experience.
Another controversy surrounding this book is rooted in the field of education and the usefullness that this book provides. Quite simply this is opinion. My mother who read this book when she was younger felt that it served no purpose either way, negatively or positively. However I felt that this book scared me to death on certain parts and was somewhat of a horror story and I can only imagine that it would be a deterrent to drugs for most kids. There are alot of kids however, who may think that this is a cool lifestyle and be attracted to the idea of getting involved in that lifestyle. For me I would say that the book is not an important or necessary read but I also do not believe in banning ANY book for ANY reason, so I think it should be made available to all but not pushed. It is not extremely well written or deeply meaningful so I don't thing it is useful to English teachers for any one thing.
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