Reading with Appeal in Mind
Billy Lynn’s Long Halftime Walk
By Ben Fountain
Billy Lynn and his fellow marines from Brava Company
have been returned from Iraq to tour the country as heroes after surviving a
firestorm. The last day of the whirlwind
hero’s tour finds them at Cowboys Stadium on Thanksgiving Day where they will
be the honored guests and halftime participants of the Dallas Cowboys. The author carefully sets the pace to match
the pace of a tour in Iraq, it is slow moving but with a lot going on with
Billy Lynn’s world. This is an antiwar
book at its heart; where the protagonist struggles to understand what his
purpose is and why he is in the fight at all.
Camaraderie and loyalty are themes that prevail throughout the storyline
as Billy Lynn struggles with his decision to return to Iraq or remain in
Texas. Fountain allows us to follow
Billy Lynn, a smart young man, who, because of an impulsive decision, got
thrown into a life that should have been different. He should have gone to college after high
school and spent the next four years partying and studying. Billy is everyman,
and so the language of the novel is for everyman as well; it’s easy to
understand and follow along. Life and
death, loyalty and family, grief and love are things Billy struggles to understand
and are expertly conveyed through the language and tone throughout the story.
Looking for Alaska by John Green
John Green’s Looking for Alaska is not your typical
teenage angst book, this book is more Separate Peace and Catcher in the Rye. The main character is Miles Halter, not your
typical teenager,he has decided to leave his nondescript hometown in Florida
and head off to boarding school in Culver Creek, Alabama where he hopes he’ll
find a life more than ordinary. He has
memorized the last words of many famous people including dying poet Francois
Rabelais who’s last words spoke of a
Great Perhaps. Miles hopes to find his
Great Perhaps at boarding school. His
roommate Chip, also known as the colonel introduces him to another classmate,
the beautiful, Alaska Young. Soon Miles, now nicknamed Pudge by the Colonel, is
on his way to his own Great Perhaps.
The book is set in an non airconditioned boarding
school in Alabama where you are first introduced to the setting by way of the
sweat pouring off Miles as he unpacks his suitcases to set up his room. The
tone of the book is not like your typical teen book, there’s no whining or
angst: the characters are real kids with quirks, lives and problems, richly
characterized and developed. There are the
rich kids called Weekday Warriors since they come to school for the week but
leave for the weekend. And then there are scholarship kids, kids who are not
rich who know that being at Culver is a way to move ahead, but are also still
just kids, who like to play pranks, and are also growing up and learning about
themselves. But these are not typical
teens using just teen lingo and language, these are smart kids and proud of
it. Proud of the fact that while they
may not be the best athletes, they are the smartest! But they are still kids,
kids who make impetuous decisions and face the consequences of the
decisions.
