The Chosen One

Of the many books I've read this week (thank God its summer), the only one that has brought out any strong emotion was The Chosen One, by Carol Lynch Williams. It's the story of a thirteen-year-old girl who lives in a polygamist compound, and finds out she must marry her uncle to fulfill the Prophet's vision. The Prophet is the leader of the community, and in his sacred vision, he "saw" Kyra, the brave protagonist, becoming the seventh wife of her father's 63-year-old brother.

Naturally, Kyra wants to escape, but in a world where thugs called the God Squad have killed and beaten would-be escapees many times before, this is no easy goal. And the more Kyra resists the will of the Prophet, the higher the stakes get, and the more they watch her. She has allies - the boy she loves, Joshua, and the owner of a traveling library named Patrick. But when these allies fall to the power of the Prophet and his violent supporters, she has to keep trying by herself.

Naturally, this book reminded me of the Texas polygamist cult that was raided in recent years. The enormous numbers of children, the long hair and dresses for girls, the adherence to an extreme version of Christianity - it was all the same. But when the Texas cult was raided, I looked on with some sympathy. It seemed as though these people, with their odd way of life, were not exactly wrong or bad, just different. But in The Chosen One, the blatant sexism, the rejection from the compound of some boys (to leave enough wives for the others), and the near-worship of community leaders is all clearly wrong. There is nothing natural about the violence, the marriage of young teen girls to old men who have wives already, the physical discipline used on both children and women, or the deitous power of the so-called Prophet and his Apostles.

One wonders how much creative liscence the author took. How accurate is the portrayal of violence? Do some community members really live in decadant luxury, while most live in trailers? Would a young girl really be asked to marry her elderly uncle? Do they really go to such extreme measures to prevent escape? Of course, if this were an Amish community, the answer would be no; they just live as though in the past, certainly without polygamy, and they send their young people into the "real world" for a year of their adolescence, to make sure they really want to be Amish. But what about cults, like the one in Texas? It's hard to know for sure. But as someone who rarely condemns a type of worship, or a lifestyle, that is different from my own, I can honestly say that this kind of polygamy on an isolated compound is disgusting, cruel, and wrong.

This is possibly why this book made such an impression on me; it forced me to make a judgement about a group of people, something I normally avoid at all costs. I would recommend reading The Chosen One, and see what you think - is it accurate? Is it objective? Is this lifestyle, under any circumstances, acceptable? Not that I would find fault with women and children born into it, or even men who would have a hard time escaping; it is the leaders and founders of such cults who should be ashamed of their selfishness, violence, and un-Christian behavior.

Brave New World

I've been swamped with school - sorry about the time between posts! Anyways, I recently read Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, which I thought was a really valuable satire, and surprisingly relevant (considering it was written about 1930).



In Brave New World, although the human race is capable of creating perfectly healthy humans (with a mistake here or there, but still), they create an entire class with subhuman mental capabilities, and other classes that were less strong and intelligent than they could have been.


This raises two questions: does some one always have to be on the bottom? And is it the same to have disabilities imposed by the system, or imposed by chance?


In the book they explain that for stability, there must be some classes who have less power and privilege than others. There are plenty of economic and political ideas that support or disprove this concept. The latter question, however, is more difficult to talk about. If we had complete control over things like severe autism and Downs Syndrome, would it be wrong for the powers that be to mandate that a certain number of "disabled" people be created? Is that heartless, or copying nature? On a personal level, the concept of poisoning embryos (as they do in Brave New World) to stunt their growth and development disgusts me. This is a horrid example of how science can be used in a way that it should never be used. But when it comes to controlling a planet, is it necessary for some people to have lower intelligence, so that they aren't discontented with boring, simple jobs? Is this doing them a favor - if someone has to do these jobs - to "condition" them to be content? Or is it a heinous, artificial imitation of one of nature's faults?


Unlike many satires, which ridicule one or two simple issues or individuals, Brave New World raises questions that are almost impossible to answer. If you haven't read it, I would. Even after finishing it, I am still questioning things in the world around me that I previously didn't give much thought to - everything from religion, to self-punishment, to marriage's place in society. In my opinion, that makes it a book that was worth my time.

A Moon for the Misbegotten

So on a poll a while back, the vote was for me to read & review this play. I've been ridiculously busy, but here it is, ladies and gentlemen: A Moon For the Misbegotten, by Eugene O'Neill.



This brief, all-American play probably would've been boring to see, but I truly enjoyed reading it. In the italicized phrases interspersed in the dialogue, as well as describing set and characters, there was a great deal of imagery and emotion that enriched the experience. Unlike many plays, which are simply lacking when put on paper, A Moon for the Misbegotten was a lively and thought provoking book.


Since this play has a relatively simple plot, and very little action, the true artistry is in the characters and their developments. There is only one flat character, the pompous neighbor named Harder, who adds an element of comedy and is as flat as my own pompous next-door neighbors seem to be in real life. The rest of the characters are warm, regretful, anxious, proud, sinful, loyal, and loving. Josie, the only female character, is at once proud of her strenghth and ashamed of her great size, which are almost universal sentiments among women. Jim Tyrone is both a cynic and a romantic, and Hogan is a hard-nosed, heavy-drinking, big-hearted old man. The three of them, with their all of their hope and insurmountable baggage, spend the time in the play in a mixture of intimate comfort and convoluted loneliness.


It may be personal to me, or a result of O'Neill's superior characterization, but I found myself relating to everyone in the story on a deep personal level. Josie's pride and love, Hogan's craftiness and underlying good intentions, Tyrone's dislike for himself and the world... there were so many similarities that I felt as though the play were a direct part of my life as I read it. I don't know if others have had similar experiences reading this, but I suggest you try - it's only about 150 pages - and I wouldn't be surprised if you find yourself identifying with the characters in this brilliant play.


Happy Reading!

Flash Burnout

Young Adult Fiction seems to be my main source of reading material recently; when I have more time, I'll read and report on either more classic literature, or something new and controversial. In the meantime, here's a quick and colorful book. It's called Flash Burnout, by L. K. Madigan. The main character is a guy in high school who's also the narrator, which is why I say it's colorful; his thoughts are what I imagine actually goes through the heads of the guys around me. If you're too young, too old, or too sheltered, you might have to Urban Dictionary some of the terms he uses.

This whole book is tied together by photography, which is the narrator/protagonist's passion. In the story, his best female friend is having trouble with her mother, a meth addict, and things are heating up with his high-maintenance girl friend. He's a pretty normal kid, and the book is fun to read, although the plot probably won't get your heart racing too often. It's written by a woman (this took extensive research to find out, since nothing in the book specified) so all it tells us is that all women (well, okay, me and her) assume the most of the same things about the thoughts and feelings of teen guys.

The one thing I got out of reading this, to be honest, was a really strong desire to either take up photography or befriend someone who already has. Or both. But if you need some entertainment, I'd recommend Flash Burnout.

You Are What You Hear

Candor, by Pam Bachorz, is a supremely creepy book. It's about a boy who lives in a special town that his father founded, where music containing subliminal messages is used to control the people who live there. Catchy phrases turn them into loose-clothing-wearing, healthy-food-eating, nonartistic, avidly academic individuals. No one wears eye makeup or nailpolish or holds hands in public, and teenagers never drink alcohol or make out in movie theatres. And if they ever leave and forget to take some of the special music with them, they will go insane and die a violent suicidal death. Oscar, the protagonist, has found a way to outsmart his father, but he's still stuck in this strange microcosm, with questions of love, control and honesty to confront. The entire book was full of suspense - will he escape? Will anyone escape? Will they all be brainwashed by the evil Mr. Banks, with no hope of free thought?

Clearly Bachorz believes that a) the media can affect us without our realization and b) our music, and the messages it contains, can define who we are. I agree that the words in songs, as well as the pictures and articles in magazines and the things we see on TV, can change both our perception and our goals more than we expect, but I think villainizing music is a pretty strong exageration of this concept. Then again, maybe the exageration is necessary to catch our attention.

Crooked, Zipped, and Crushed

These are three seperate books, by one married couple of authors. They aren't a series, but they are all "young adult" books, and they're all about pretty normal American teenagers. If I were a guy, I would probably be most interested in Zipped and least interested in Crushed, but if you like one of these, you'll probably like all of them.




Crooked was the first book I read by Laura and Tom McNeal, and it's about a girl with a crooked nose and no mother. There's a bad guy and a good guy who sometimes seem to change roles, and a really bad guy. Reading it felt like moving to a new town and getting to know new people, only probably a bit more exciting. The characters were all "round" characters, as my English teacher calls them, and I liked it a lot. This one gets 4.5 outta 5 stars.

Zipped was mainly told from a guy's point of view. It was full of questions and matters of perspective and identity, covering everything from adultery to racism to Mormon culture. It had one of the best quotes-within-a-story I've ever come across when two characters discuss the lyrics of a showtune, and no one was completely bad or completely good. 4 stars.

I honestly didn't want to read Crushed, but I liked the other two books enough to try it, and it wasn't terrible. Everyone it it was dealing with loss, whether that involved money, friends, family, or some combination thereof, and it was honestly pretty interesting. The characters, though, all seemed either naive or distrustworthy, except a few nice ones, who's importance levels fell somewhere between benchwarmers and supporting actors. So everyone likable was basically a "flat character". I think I should have stopped after Zipped, but this book isn't a total waste of time. 3 stars.

Has anyone else read any of these? Would you want to? Does the label "Young Adult Literature" affect whether or not you want to?

Say You're One of Them

I think there are authors who think that happy endings are boring, predictable, and less meaningful to the reader. They may be right. I also think that Uwem Akpan, author of Say You're One of Them, is one of these authors.

This collection of fictional stories by a smiley Jesuit priest from Nigeria doesn't have a single happy ending. There are bittersweet endings, endings that are twisted with relief and regret, and endings that leave you cold. But, as I recently learned how to say in Spanish, Todas las cuentas acaban mal. They have sad endings.

If you feel like you now don't have to read these stories, don't get me wrong; the endings are often unpredictable, some ending with what we hoped for all along, but not quite as happy, and some ending with what the characters dreaded, but we were too naive to believe possible.

These stories of Africa, exploring ordeals that happen to people there, and not rarely, are all unnerving. I had to ask myself, over and over, what seperates me from them? There are answers - physical distance, money, language - but they pale in comparison to the similarities, the unnerving proximities. Like Jubril, am I not at the mercy of the crowd whenever I take a bus or a train, or a plane? Could the others not kill me, if all incensed and united against me? Could I not lose my parents in an instant, like Kotchikpa, and find myself at the mercy of the world? These stories take place in an alternate universe, one that exists, only a plane ride away.

Some people don't read "depressing" stories, because they say that there isn't anything they can do about it. But maybe, if we read about the struggles of others, we won't be tempted to prey upon the one Muslim in a group of Christians, even in times of desperation and fear. Maybe we won't turn against our neighbors and families when there is a crisis, because we see how horrific it was when it happened in Rwanda. Maybe we won't ignore those charities that help child slaves just because they seem so far away, and we'll be careful where and how we get our oil and diamonds. So read Say You're One of Them, by Uwem Akpan. Maybe you'll learn something about life, or yourself.