A few months ago, I discovered a cool cigarette-machine-turned-art-machine at my local Whole Foods store and promptly broke it. (It was an accident, I promise.) Since it didn’t work, I didn’t get to find out what sorts of treasures awaited inside.
This week, I went back and was delighted to find the sad little “out of order” sign gone. I decided to try my luck again, and this time it worked! (Which is a relief because I didn’t want to to tell the nice guys at Whole Foods that I broke their machine again.)
Which treasures did I choose?
Why, slug soap and monsters, naturally.
Monsters = no brainer. I like monsters. I also think slugs are pretty cool when I am not stepping on them or trying to keep my dog from eating them. The slug on this package reminds me of the large plastic slug that I found and made into a necklace for my good friend Emily. (Yes, of course she liked it. Why do you ask?) I couldn’t resist seeing it in soap form.
I was so excited to find out what was inside these cigarette-pack-shaped boxes that I opened them up in my car. The advertising did not lie. I got a monster and slug soap.
The monster is a little weird. Ok, they’re both weird. But the monster is more weird because I’m not sure what to do with it. At first I thought it was a magnet, which would have been cool, but no. It’s just a tiny painting of a vampire (with a side of Dracula trivia). I think this one is destined to become a stocking stuffer. (Get ready, friends and family! Any one of you could be the lucky recipient!)
The slug soap is, in my opinion, much cooler and also quite practical. I look forward to washing my hands with this little guy and watching him melt away like he’s been salted. (Don’t do that to real slugs! It’s mean!)
So, mystery solved. What’s inside the weird art machine? Weird art. Its existence makes me happy.
I’ve been so caught up in April being National Poetry Month that I almost missed the fact that it’s also National Autism Awareness Month. Strangely enough, I actually read two books this month told from the perspective of a character with Asperger’s syndrome– The Rosie Projectby Graeme Simsion, which is a romantic comedy for adults, and The London Eye Mysteryby Siobhan Dowd, which is a young adult novel. I really enjoyed them. The Rosie Project is an extremely entertaining novel with dozens of laugh-out-loud moments, and The London Eye Mystery has compelling characters, realistic drama, and (most surprising to me) is also a very good mystery. I recommend them both.
While it is somewhat ironic that I happened to pick up these two titles during the month of April, it is no coincidence that I chose to read books about characters facing the challenges of Asperger’s. I have been drawn to stories that tackle this subject for years now, ever since I began meeting people on the autism spectrum in my classroom.
During my last eight years of teaching seventh grade English, I taught a dozen or so students who had been diagnosed with autism or Asperger’s, or who were undiagnosed but showed symptoms of the syndrome. I also interacted with several more students who were not in my classroom but who attended my school. The middle school where I taught was excellent at providing the support these students needed while also making sure they received the respect they deserved from adults and peers alike. I was proud to work there.
Working with students who faced these challenges inspired me to learn more and, since I prefer fiction over nonfiction, I looked to novels to give me glimpses inside lives of people with autism and their families. I read: Rules by Cynthia Lord, Al Capone Does My Shirts by Gennifer Choldenko, Mockingbird by Kathryn Erskine, and Anything But Typical by Nora Raleigh Baskin. This month, I added the two new titles to my list. I enjoyed all of these books, but my favorite was Anything But Typical. It provided, for me, the best insights into the minds of my former students. My full review of the book is below.
One more thing: Even though the books I’ve listed above have been well-received and, in some cases, have won awards, you will still find reviews criticizing them for portraying too unrealistic or too limited an image of people on the autism spectrum. I am not trying to disagree with those readers. These books are fiction, and I don’t believe that a book exists (fiction or nonfiction) that can truly teach me what it’s like to have autism. And even if it does exist, it would only show me one person’s perspective. Every person with autism is unique. Despite the collective label, despite the similar symptoms and behaviors, no two people are alike. Period.
If you’re interested in learning more about autism and Asperger’s syndrome, I suggest you head over to Autism Speaks after reading this book review.
Anything by Typical by Nora Raleigh Baskin
Anything But Typical is told from the first person perspective of Jason Blake, a twelve-year-old boy with autism and (therefore) a whole lot of acronyms to deal with, from IEP to NLD to PDD-NOS. Jason perceives the world very differently from NTs (neurotypicals) and his preference for silence over unnecessary talk and the way he avoids looking at faces (because trying to decipher them is distracting) can be frustrating for those around him, even (especially) those closest to him. Jason’s outlet, the place where he can express himself and show his creativity, is writing. He even makes friends with a girl on the Storyboard site where he posts his fiction stories. But when various coincidences lead him to a convention where he could come face to face with his new friend, Jason’s anxiety increases to new levels. He doesn’t want this girl to see him. He doesn’t want her to know.
This is a great book. It ranks right up there with some of my other favorite YA novels about kids who are different, like Rules by Cynthia Lord and Out of My Mind by Sharon Draper. Anything But Typical is told with touching honesty. As a former middle school teacher, I can say from experience that Baskin’s description of Jason’s behavior in the library when his favorite computer is in use is excellent. And her portrayal of Jason’s misunderstood relationship with his mother is both beautiful and heartbreaking. These few lines from page 68 sum it up for me:
“Isn’t it funny, Jason?” my mother is saying. “Isn’t it funny that when you were really little you wouldn’t wear a belt at all? Isn’t that funny?”
I love my mother so much.
“Remember, Jason?” she is saying. “Remember those leggings?”
We are both remembering the same thing.
“Those leggings?” I repeat what she has said, so she will know this.
“No?” my mother is saying. “You don’t? It’s okay. It was a long time ago. Well, let’s go, shall we?”
The book made me want a second chance at understanding some of my former students with autism and asperger’s syndrome and, more than anything else, it made me want to give their moms a big hug.
My only complaints about this book are minor. There were a few typos that were distracting because at first I was trying to figure out if they were purposeful due to the first person narrator, and I felt that Jeremy, the brother, acted a lot younger than his nine years. But overall I really enjoyed this story and I was very pleased that it did NOT end with Jason writing the book. That ending has been a bit over-done in YA lit and I thought for awhile that was where this novel was heading.
I know what you’re thinking—Duh. But I’m not talking about the ones between their pages. I’m not talking about their own stories, the tales they tell universally to anyone who reads them. I’m talking about the stories they tell to each of us, individually. Our stories.
That’s right. Books tell us our own stories. It’s just one of their many super powers.
In the Author’s Note of A Monster Calls, Patrick Ness writes, “Stories don’t end with the writers, however many started the race.” This young adult novel tells the story of a grieving boy and a dying mother and a monster and a yew tree. But it also tells the story of two writers—Patrick Ness and Siobhan Dowd—connected by life and death and the stories in between. Dowd died of cancer at age forty-seven, leaving behind the notes for her next book. Ness, who’d never met her, turned those notes into a story that was part hers, part his, something new that he hopes she would have liked.
He’s right. Stories don’t end with the writers. I have a small library on the bookcases in my home– volumes of fiction, horror, young adult lit, poetry, memoirs, short stories, and reference books– but there are so many more stories stored on those shelves than you can see just by looking.
My poetry books and all their many stories tucked inside.
My copy of Good Omens, by Neil Gaiman and Terry Pratchett not only tells a very funny story about the apocalypse, it also tells a very sweet story of a couple falling in love. When my husband and I first started dating, we read that book together, taking turns reading aloud to each other, sharing laughs and lingering looks. I loved the book—it’s hilarious and you should read it. But when you do, you’ll only get half the story the book tells to me when I look at it.
Louis Sachar’s Sixth Grade Secrets, which I read in the sixth grade and then re-read last month, was one of my favorite books as a kid, but in addition to telling the story of secret clubs and mean pranks and first crushes, it also tells the story of one of my most shameful moments. In the seventh grade, I used one of the pranks from the book on one of my best friends and made her cry. I don’t know why I did it. Maybe I was a mean kid, or maybe I just wanted to see if it would work. It did, and I have regretted it ever since. Whenever I hear people complaining about movies and TV and video games being bad influences on kids, I think of this—how I got the idea for my cruelty from a book.
[Note: Despite the fact that it brought out my bad side, Sixth Grade Secrets is still a good book, and it holds up well twenty-five years after it was written. I was particularly impressed, during my recent reading, at how “un-girly” the girls are in the story, which is to say, they are simply girls, which is to say, they are simply people, with varied styles, interests, and personalities. The generic stereotyped fashion-freak girls that inhabit some of today’s YA are nowhere to be found in Sachar’s sixth grade world.]
This book certainly has some stories to tell. Image courtesy of Thomas Cutter, middle school teacher.
Personal memories aren’t the only things that add layers to books. Sometimes it’s something else, like a connection outside in the world. I remember once, many years ago, I was reading The Outsiders by the pool at my apartment (this was early in my teaching career, before I had the book almost-memorized) and the moment my eyes landed on the word “train” I heard a train whistle off in the distance. Recently, when I was listening to Angie Sage’s Queste in my car, just as the narrator read the words “wizard castle” I glanced up to see a sign for “Wizard Castle Tattoo.”
These things happen more often than you might think. When they occur, I feel like the universe is reading over my shoulder, providing sound effects and illustrations to enhance my reading experience. I appreciate it.
Then there are used books.
Recycled Books – Denton, TX
Used books are the best because many come with their original stories and the stories of their previous owners. You never know what unexpected tales you’ll find tucked inside a previously owned book. Bookmarks, postcards, love notes, grocery lists, phone numbers, photographs, insane ramblings in the margins—it all tells a story.
Just last Friday, I visited the wonderfully-peculiar and many-leveled Recycled Books in Denton with the wonderfully-peculiar and many-faceted Annie Neugebauer. We were sitting on the yellow shag carpeting in front of the Ray Bradbury shelf, smelling books and discussing horror magazines and the pronunciations of German last names when Annie opened a book to find this gem:
Photo courtesy of Annie Neugebauer, who is now the proud owner of Bradbury’s The Illustrated Man, a couple of jellyfish, and a whole lot of lime (Lyme?) disease.
I don’t know what that book’s story is. I just know that our laughter from the floor of Recycled Books is now a part of it too.
“Stories don’t end with writers.” Patrick Ness was right. All writers really do is get the story started. Once they’re in the hands of readers, books soak up more worlds, more experiences, more meaning. Ness ends his note to the reader by saying, “Go. Run with it. Make trouble.” I look forward to the day when my own novels are out there making trouble in the world. I hope the stories my books tell (both the ones I write and the ones the readers find hidden inside) are good ones.
With that in mind, I guess I’d better get back to work on that novel draft.
Carie Juettner 