Homeboyz by Alan Lawrence Sitomer

I wasn't sure about this one at first--trying to decide if Sitomer was going to go the Mark Twain route with writing dialect. As the read progressed, however, the story took over and it got better. Or I got past the language; I'm not sure which. 

I can't help but wonder, however, if there is background that readers would have had they read Sitomer's other novels, Hoopster and Hip-Hop High School first. I get the feeling that the characters first appear there, and this story is a continuation in the same universe. That also might explain the exposition at the beginning that I had a hard time getting through. 

I'm not sure if the ending is realistic either, but it is hopeful. 

I did have one student who started the novel last semester (before he lost it) and he was pretty into it. So much so that he decided he wanted to take it to his English class for SSR. I can appreciate that. 

If you've read and liked Homeboyz, you might also like Street Pharm by Allison van Diepen (link option is broken, so here's a link to a synopsis on Goodreads: http://goo.gl/aFHc).

The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins

Of the books I've read in 2009, The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins, is in the top five. It might actually be ranked #1. House of the Scorpion was fantastic, too. One of the things I liked best about this novel was every prediction that I made (minus who was going to win, since I know it's a trilogy) was incredibly wrong.

I had a kid start to read it last semester and he just didn't get it. Why is it that students, and not just the struggling readers that I teach, have issues with any fiction that isn't realistic. So the fact that Katniss, Peeta and Gale live in a world that is dissimilar to their own makes it difficult for many to understand. I am fairly certain, however, if the student had pressed on instead of giving up in the first couple pages, he would have enjoyed the violence of the second and third section, when the games started.

It's an interesting take on Survival of the Fittest. Made me think of Lord of the Flies a little. Except with media coverage. And with outside people imposing on the survival. It's interesting how the media changes the way people act. Had there not been cameras on them constantly, I'm sure Katniss would never have led Peeta on. Funny how she always had the fact that there were cameras present in the back of her mind, guiding some of her conscious actions.

It's a wonder that the Capitol couldn't see the barbarism of collecting two children from each of the districts and forcing them to commit murder. It's even sadder that the people bought into it and allowed the reaping to continue to happen. Sometimes I wonder if stories like Collins's are prophetic. Or stories like M.T. Anderson's Feed.

Given the state of things, where are we headed?

On Monster by Walter Dean Myers

The question concerning this novel is...

Is Steve Harmon guilty of murder?

That's the first question we addressed when discussing the Walter Dean Myers novel Monster on Tuesday in RDG 598. The introductory activity was an interesting one. On a slip of paper, we pretended we were the jury at the end of the novel and cast our vote for guilty or innocent. In my way, I had to point out that while I didn't find Steve guilty, I also could not find him innocent. The best I could come up with is not guilty of the crime for which he was tried.

One of the main reasons I cannot find him innocent has to do with the reliability of the narrator. (We read an article about it, and of course I can't find that article now.) The story is told in script format; the main character is writing the screenplay for a movie. For some reluctant/struggling readers, this can be a little off-putting at first, especially if they have had little exposure to drama. But it's Steve's story, and he reserves the poetic license to change any details he wants to serve his purposes. We see this most clearly in his testimony, which was pointed out by one of my classmates. In his musings that do not belong to the script portion of the story, he reflects on going into the convenience store to buy mints. In his testimony, he says that he'd never been in the store. I don't know if I trust Steve to tell the whole truth now.

But should he be found guilty of murdering the gentleman in the store? I don't think so. Accessory, at best.

What's interesting is I thought about this particular discussion on Wednesday, when a student of mine locked my class in the patio, which caused a ruckus in the hallway during instructional time. I took my class outside to play vocabulary baseball--a nice change from studying in chairs under fluorescent lights. On the way in, one student convinces another to lock the door. The one doing the convincing might have been the one who also caused the ruckus, but I have no witnesses to corroborate that story. What I do have eye-witness testimony of, however, is the student who locked the door. Back in the classroom, one student tries to inflict the consequences of her actions on the other student because the other student told her to do it. Steve Harmon didn't kill the guy in the store. Student 2 didn't lock the class in the patio. They didn't like that answer too much.

Many people thought Steve to be a monster. Do I think he's a monster? No. And the message I hope kids take away from the novel is to think about the consequences of their actions, and keep themselves from becoming monsters.

"Charm" from The Rose and the Beast

A feature of young adult literature that I stress to my students is that it can be a mirror, reflecting their own lives, or a window, allowing them to see into someone else’s. The situation that underscores “Charm” is one that far too many adolescents may be familiar with. In this short story, we see thematic ideas on abuse and drug use.

With a rise in cyberbullying, there is also a rise in child pornography, though actually created at the hands of the children. To that end, adolescents will be able to identify with the protagonist and her friend, in light of the naked pictures taken of two young girls shackled together. I have heard of girls who take naked pictures of themselves with their cell phones and forward them to other people. While the story doesn’t suggest direct repercussions for those actions, the reader is presented with a world in which the protagonist is disconsolate and removed from herself.

We also get a sense that the protagonist is sexually abused, whether it be while she is high, in trade for drugs, or in a situation she cannot remove herself from. The familiarity with this scene can not only be with the rape, but also with the sense of powerlessness and dissociation that many victims experience during a trauma.

While opium isn’t a drug that many are familiar with anymore—I associate it with authors like Samuel Taylor Coleridge—a clear picture is drawn for the reader that Rev is on drugs. The way the narrator describes Rev’s addiction can be familiar to students, how the drugs feel like “ecstasy of pure honeyed delight in her veins, like being infused with the soul she had lost” (Block, 2000, 73). With the climate on the border the way it is right now, if nothing else, this image serves as a window into the world of someone the reader is close to or has heard about. The detox scene is similarly vivid, though done differently than scenes in novels like Go Ask Alice (Anonymous, 1971). The drug line of thematic idea resolves quasi-happily, with the realization that the drug is no longer necessary.


Anonymous. (1971). Go Ask Alice. New York: Simon Pulse.
Block, F. (2000). The Rose and the Beast. New York: Joanna Cotler Books.

What is Young Adult Literature?

This post is in response to this prompt for ENGL 363: What is young adult literature? What are the concerns/themes of young adult literature? In other words, what is this literature about? How do these stories relate to the fairy tales we read?

What is young adult literature? Just like television shows like Dawson’s Creek, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, Felicity and Popular were geared toward a teenage audience, such is the nature of young adult literature. Nancie Atwell, in her teacher’s text In the Middle, that the same way adults use novels to see the “universalities of our condition” (Atwell, 1998, p. 36), so can young adults “find their perspectives reflected and explored in a body of fiction of their own, books that can help them grow up and books that can help them love books” (Atwell, 1998, p. 36).

I tell my reading students that for them, in my class, fiction will be one of two things: a window, or a mirror. And that’s essentially what young adult literature is. Young adult literature provides an avenue for adolescents to explore issues and situations that mirror their own lives or the lives of people around them, allow them to make a text-to-self connection, thereby working through the painful issues of adolescence. Young adult literature also provides an avenue for adolescents to explore issues that they are not familiar with, a window into other worlds.

It is difficult to narrow a genre of literature, a growing body of work, into a short list of concerns or themes that interest young adult readers. Some major concerns or themes within this body of literature, those hit close to home for many readers are self-identity/self-discovery, family issues, overcoming adversity, sexuality, and violence.

The two specific major themes from young adult literature that are present in the fairy tales we read are sexuality and violence. Throughout many of the fairy tales we witnessed violence against children, namely in the form of neglect. We’ve also seen parents’ sexuality come into question in the form of lust after their own children. The voice used in The Rose and the Beast (Block, 2000), is decidedly adolescent throughout all of the stories.

See also, "Characteristics of Young Adult Literature" on BlogForLiteracy

Atwell, N. (1998). In the Middle: New Understandings About Writing, Reading and Learning. Portsmouth, NH: Boynton/Cook Publishers.
Block, F. (2000). The Rose and the Beast. New York: Joanna Cotler Books.