Little Boxes All the Same

To start off, this is now officially one of my favorite novels.

In a land where we are often expected to tow the line of the norm and not standout, I understand the need to escape. Like an adolescent filled to the brim with helium dreams, with my eyes set on adventure, I'll float away into the abyss and never come back.

Unless my dreams are popped by those who don't believe in me,
And I fall back to the ground,
And am picked up by a child playing in the park,
And shoved into a trash can,
Where I can't dream
Or escape,
And then I'll never become what I thought I could be,
Or go where I thought I could go.
And my dreams will be dead.

Sometimes I wonder if this is why youthful dreams die. Do we fear too much about what could happen that we never tie ourselves to our getaway string, but instead lie limp and deflated, just hanging back on Earth with the rest of the world? What if things don't work out, what if we just end up failing and everyone knows?

What if we don't really want to escape, but just want people to think that we are bigger than this life? What if we just want someone to care? What if we want to be found but they never find the clues we leave behind?

I think I'm more like Q than I am like Margo, but I get wanting to escape but not wanting to let go...I'm not sure you can completely let go of everything. Even Margo needed to connect, whether or not she actually made the effort to do so.

I think, like Q, I want to be the one to make the connection for people. I read into things too deeply. I do think Margo wanted someone to find her – or at least make the effort – and I think it is in Q’s nature to do that. I may dream of flying to a faraway land to escape the ‘paper towns’ we live in, but I guess I don’t really want to be lost. The moment I want to be lost forever, I hope someone decides to intervene.

When Margo started describing paper towns, I thought of the song Little Boxes:

Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes made of ticky tacky,
Little boxes on the hillside,
Little boxes all the same.

There’s a green one and a pink one and a blue one and a yellow one
And they’re all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same.

And the people in the houses all went to the university
Where they were put in boxes and they came out all the same,
And there’s doctors and there’s lawyers, and business executives
And they’re all made out of ticky tacky and they all look just the same.
And they all play on the golf course and drink their martinis dry,

And they all have pretty children and the children go to school
And the children go to summer camp and then to the university
Where they are put in boxes and they come out all the same.

And the boys go into business and marry and raise a family
In boxes made of ticky tacky and they all look just the same.

Not wanting to be a cookie cutter paper girl in a paper town, or a copy of my neighbor in a land made out of ticky tacky, is the reason people want to escape and never come back.

Luckily, with an emphasis on young adult lit, I think teens understand that they really can be unique in a ticky tacky world. Finally we have a way to “float” away without actually having to be lost forever. Literature can be our escape. I wonder if things had been different if Margo had had a teacher or anyone who told her it was okay to be different or helped her find a way to escape without actually leaving. Would she still have left? I guess even she thought she was a paper girl though, so maybe nothing would have been different. Maybe she always intended to leave, and nothing could stop her.

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While thought exists, words are alive and literature becomes an escape, not from, but into living. - Cyril Connolly

Don't judge a book by its cover...

My parents have been telling me this for years, as have my teachers and various other people in my life. Generally I follow this to the T. I'll read almost anything at least once. I like to try a variety of genres. Length doesn't matter either. Basically any book has a shot at being added to my repertoire.

However, even I have been guilty of judging a book by its less-than-appealing cover art, tacking title, and overall juvenile appeal.

Needless to say, The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks started off a little rocky for me. To be fair, I was coming down with a cold and didn't really want to be reading for homework in the first place, but usually starting a novel is not that hard for me. I struggled so much because it looked like something I could picture ordering out a middle school book-order, or pick up from the kids section of the library. It didn't scream 'young adult lit' to me, but really just 'young lit'. I only made it about 30 pages into it when I started on Friday and didn't pick it up again until Sunday. I wasn't feeling any better on Sunday but I knew I had to make it through the book eventually, so I just started reading. The more I read, the more I liked it. Actually, the more I loved it! It really was very interesting and entertaining, especially when she made up negative forms for words. I found Frankie to be witty, intriguing, and everything I wished I was when I was teenager - adventurous and daring, but stealth with her actions. I was worried at first that a majority of the novel was going to revolve around her crush on Matthew, but not really. It really focused on her need to be included and her incredible intelligence.

I think the quick mention of her old boyfriend in the first few pages and her sudden blossoming into womanhood, combined with the stereotypical young adult lit cover, is what pushed me over the edge. Once I finished the novel, I really wanted more, and I was angry with myself that I almost didn't get into it at all because I was so set on not liking it. And I LOVE to read. I was dreading the novel because I "knew" it was going to be about some preteen/teen struggling through school, with a crush on the coolest kid who doesn't really know her, and a family that doesn't understand her. Luckily, there was much more to it than that, but I think it's important to acknowledge that this is what I got from it right away. If I had doubts right away, and I LOVE to read and will give almost ANYTHING a shot, how can I expect my future students, who may not like reading at all (especially not when it is required), to read and enjoy a book that is packaged to look juvenile. I can't imagine passing this novel to a 17-year-old boy and saying "Enjoy!" without him looking as if it's the most painful thing he's ever held in his hand. Okay, well maybe it won't be that extreme, but I have a point. I think it should be presented as young adult lit, not young adult lit. There are a lot of themes in young adult lit that are completely relevant for junior high and high school students, but if it's presented as being something that's written for people their age, it sometimes hurts itself by appearing too "young". How can we make young adult lit seem as interesting and academically challenging as works by Shakespeare, Lee's To Kill a Mockingbird, or Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451, when it looks like something a 6th grader might pick up?

So, even though it started rough and I don't like how it is packaged, I flew through the novel in an afternoon. I do think high schoolers would find it really interesting too, and that it could be an interesting read for boys and girls. I just don't know if the appearance would have a negative impact on students.

After finishing the novel, I thought I would get a head start on our next one, Paper Towns. As soon as I picked it up I thought, "Man, this is something I could see sitting on the 'Buy 2, Get 1 Free' table at Borders, not in the young adult lit section." Then I opened it, read the first line and realized that you really can't judge a book by its cover. Looks like a long story about a boy's lifelong love for his next door neighbor...hopefully I'm pleasantly surprised.

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The world is a book and those who do not travel read only a page. - Augustine

"I had a dream I reached inside my chest and held my heart, to try to keep it still."

There aren't really words to describe how much I enjoyed Skim. I felt like I really knew her by the end, that she had let me in on all of her deepest secrets, all of her insecure thoughts, but I think I learned more about life than I did about her.

To me, (S)kim seemed to be the stereotypical adolescent. She didn't quite fit in with everyone around her, she wasn't really fond of her home life, she was struggling with her new found crush, and she didn't know how to express her self (or perhaps she just didn't care to). (S)kim was so concerned with acknowledging her distaste for stuff that we really didn't learn too much about her. Even her thoughts appear to be filtered, for the most part. What intrigued me the most was the fact that she crossed out her own thoughts, as if she didn't want us toe hear her say them, but really she couldn't hide anything from us.

Or maybe she was hiding everything.

Is (S)kim so insecure that she can't even think the truth because she doesn't trust us?

I do think there was a lot of truth in what (S)kim told us, but I think it is fair to assume that her guard was up almost the entire time. She told us what she wanted to tell us, just enough to pull us in, but not enough to fully know who she was. Luckily, while she was crossing out thoughts and possibly keeping quiet about various things, the illustration gave us a deeper look into her life that even she might not have been able to explain.

I guess I liked the secrecy though. It felt real. Why should she tell us everything? If she can't trust her own friend, how can she trust perfect strangers? But then again, maybe the person she didn't trust was herself. Maybe she needed to write through her feelings in order to make sense of it all. I liked Skim. It was a really cool way to tell a story, and I felt myself longing for more in the end. I guess that's the truest test of success - leaving your readers wishing that the story would go on forever...

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You know you've read a good book when you turn the last page and feel a little as if you have lost a friend. - Paul Sweeney