Wolf Boy by Evan Kuhlman

My original intention was to write a little blurb about every book I read. That intention has fallen by the wayside as the school year battles on and my time at the computer becomes scarce. So I've skipped over two books in order to keep up to date with my thoughts and my more current readings. The two books were Robber Bride by Margaret Atwood (lovely, as always, and quite intricate) and Plainsong by Ken Haruf (lonely, bleak at times, but satisfying in the end.) I just didn't have much to say about either of them, and had soon moved on to the next book.

The next book this time around was Wolf Boy by Evan Kuhlman. I am a firm believer in judging a book by its cover, and many, many times have used this old backwards adage to chose the next book I will read. But just look at this cover:


I was helpless to resist. I picked it off the shelf and carefully, gingerly even, opened the book to see that within the pages and pages of words rested scatterings of a graphic novel.


The book is sweet and touching and still somehow avoids that maudlin touch that plagues all novels about grieving. In the story, a young man is killed in a car crash, and the novel follows the immediate effects of his death on his family. One of these effects is the creation of Wolf Boy, the comic book character, by the grieving brother.
The most interesting and honest moments in the book occur as the reader watches the parents of the boy deal with his death. The mother completely loses any sense of herself, and the father tries to be open with his grief and just ends up making everyone uncomfortable. The novel explores the idea that everyone deals with grief their own way. This truth is something that makes funerals always uncomfortable and difficult -- besides the obvious fact that a loved one has just died. You are always expected to push yourself into someone else's idea of what it means to grieve. And that springform pan does not fit anyone perfectly.
The family doesn't reach any definitive change in the end, but the realism of that ending is just the kind of thing that draws me to this book. Sometimes I look for a lack of reality in a book, but every now and then it's nice to feel the mirror of the novel turn towards humanity.

What Was She Thinking? [Notes on a Scandal] by Zoe Heller

With the building boom in Las Vegas, there have been many job opportunities for all kinds of people. It's been a new golden age for the city. One portion of the population that has benefited job wise from this boom is the high school kid. Each builder hires several kids to stand on different street corners, holding signs shaped like Muppet-sized arrows displaying the builder's name and nearby community.
Sounds like a boring, mindless, thankless job. I'm sure it was. Until the kids started becoming Cirque du Soleil jugglers with these mammoth signs. I've seen kids twirling them in the air, throwing them like batons, and even twirling them between their legs. And with the crowds of cars driving by, it's like a movable Olympic gymnastic feast -- only everyone forgot their score cards.
Today, as I was driving home from the library, I had the unusual experience of watching someone try to flirt with me from outside my car. One of these sign kids, an older high school boy, was twirling away until he saw me drive up into the turn lane nearest him. While watching for traffic to clear up, I glanced his way, to see a toothy grin on his face as he stared right at me. He extended his arm and pointed at me, winking. Not wishing to be rude, I tentatively waved back, and he nodded, laughing at my hesitation. Then, the traffic cleared up and I drove on, shaking my head, and laughing myself.


I haven't had a young person flirt with me in awhile, but it brought to mind the Zoe Heller book I read recently. In the book, now made into a movie called "Notes on a Scandal" starring Judi Dench (genius casting at work there) and Cate Blanchett, a young, inexperienced teacher starts an affair with one of her students while an older teacher comes to her aid in a self-serving manner. The book does a superb job of starting the affair off with innocent situations and continuing along in a hyper-realistic plot line.
Also, as an educator, it's very interesting to watch the whole situation unfold and listen to the ruminations of the main character on education and its current state in the world. You read at first in empathy as the young teacher just wants to help her students yearn to learn. You read later in uncomfortable twistings as she befriends a student, knowing what is going to befall her. Lastly, you read in horror as she makes elegantly terrible decision after decision, and you wonder, "What was she thinking?"
I did worry as I scanned the bar code at the self check library station -- will I get in trouble for reading this book? Is the government watching my book selections? Will I receive a phone call in a few weeks from Homeland Security, expressing curiosities about my recent readings? So far so good, but I admit I have been checking the Caller ID more carefully than usual.