I am on a roll reading prepubs-this book isn’t due out until March of this year. I was pretty excited to get it because I really like Anderson and I was all excited that she had won YALSA’s 2009 Margaret A. Edwards award. When I opened it up though I felt a wee bit of disappointment upon realizing that it was an eating disorder book. Of all the problem novels, eating disorders are my least favorite. BUT…what a surprise I was in for. I think she has totally transcended eating disorder novels and written something very different and new. In fact, more than an eating disorder novel, I would call this a novel about mental illness and grief. I was very surprised at a)how much I liked it and b)how much suspense there was in it–from wondering how her friend Cassie died to wondering whether or not Lia will actually survive. I found this very different from her other novels in terms of both writing style and content and definitely liked it.
Archive for Anderson Laurie Halse
Wintergirls by Laurie Halse Anderson
And the winner is…
Yesterday I had the most tremendous thrill and honor of announcing YALSA’s 2009 award winning books and media (the Printz, Odyssey, Morris, and Margaret A. Edwards.) These announcements are made each January at the ALA Midwinter Meeting. As President of YALSA I got to make the YALSA announcements and this year emcee the press conference as well!
Which award did it give me the most pleasure to announce to a roomful of 500 or so librarians? Well, although the Printz is usually the one I am most excited about, this year it was the Edwards award I was most excited about. I was just so pleased with the committee’s choice of Laurie Halse Anderson as the recipient of the 2009 Margaret A. Edwards Award. This award honors an author who has made a significant and lasting contribution to young adult literature. The books specifically cited for Anderson are Speak, Fever 1793, and Catalyst. I think these books are incredible and have already established themselves firmly in the canon of ya literature (Speak is, in fact, a Printz honor book). She is a wonderful writer and I am so pleased that she has been recognized in this way.
Read more about all the awards at: www.ala.org/yma
Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson
Today was my book club day. It was my turn to host and my choice was Speak. I knew I wanted to get the group to try a YA book and a YA friend suggested this as a good choice. I totally agreed because I think this is not only a really well written book, but for adults not used to reading YA fiction, it is a pretty easy one to get into and relate to.
And that’s the beauty of this novel. You don’t have to be in Melinda’s predicament to relate to her feelings of isolation, to understand not being seen or heard, to understand the heartbreak of losing friends. Anyone who was ever an adolescent understands that. One of the interesting things we talked a lot about, that I don’t think I’ve ever talked about when discussing this with younger teens, was the idea that many of the friends Melinda lost when she started high school may not entirely have been due to the party incident. We all remembered the transition to high school as a time when we found new friends and drifted right away from old friends. So, while Melinda sees everyone deserting her as only related to the incident, we all saw it as only part of the reason. As observers looking in we also felt that a couple of her old friends would have been willing to be friendly to her, but she had just shut down so much. It was also interesting to us that the only person to say to her “you are depressed and need help”, Heather, was outsider and not really a close friend. Although Heather turned out to be fickle and shallow, she was certainly accurate in assessing Melinda.
I had read this book when it came out and I’ve heard the author speak as well as had the good fortune to meet her. This is a title I also booktalked frequently. It’s been quite a few years though since I read it, and it was very interesting to reread it and compare the actual book to what it had become in my head. I had forgotten:
how funny it is: Anderson’s writing style has a wonderful sarcastic wit, present in her other novels as well and useful here for keeping the story from getting too dark
how the school teachers are described: Mr. Neck is so vividly realized in my mind, as are the English teacher and the principal. These secondary characters bring humor to the story and also show off Melinda’s powers of observation
how well written it is: the structure of the story–divided into marking periods, and then into small sections–suits the novel so well. Also, I just think she’s an overall great writer, using words ever so well, and drawing the story out at just the right pace.
I’m so glad for myself that I reread this, and for my book club that I brought some YA lit into it. I’m hoping we’ll read more in the future. Another friend pointed out that they probably haven’t read The Giver. Unheard of to me as a librarian, but if you’re not in the library world and don’t have older children reading it in school, how would you have come across it? And that is a book that surely we could discuss for days on end…
And finally, a plug for Fever 1793 and Catalyst, also by Laurie Halse Anderson, and also wonderful books.
