I wrote a Young Adult novel ten years ago. MAKING UP MEGABOY got a lot of attention because of its format (highly illustrated with a graphic novel feel), its point of view (seventeen different voices telling the story), its subject matter (a boy who kills a man), and its end (ambiguous). Reviewers loved it or hated it, and so did young readers. Published by DK Ink, an imprint that no longer exists, it drifted out of stock and then out of print. Persistent potential purchasers -- there aren't many -- may still find a paperback copy of it through Delacorte. Every now and then when there is another nationally publicized incident of a teen or child killer, somebody remembers Megaboy, but it has pretty much faded into obscurity.
I was surprised, therefore, to get a fat pack of letters recently from Mr. Hanson's seventh grade in Sheridan, Wyoming. The students had spent the fall reading and analyzing MAKING UP MEGABOY, and they had some pretty strong reactions. Strong enough that they wanted to write to the author and tell her what they thought.
Most of the students were frustrated and annoyed by the ending, or lack of it, as they saw it. One of the more vociferous readers wrote, "You are a fool though. You could have made a good profit off this book, but you had to write this with wacky mixed up, make your own ending up story. The end was disgusting and made me regret reading it, but why did you write this story this way? WHY RUIN A GOOD STORY? You seemed like you knew what you were doing, but I have my doubts?" Another wrote, "You need to write a second book. It would be nice so people don't get mad. And why did Robby shoot Mr. Koe?" And there were many more in this vein.
Not everybody hated the book. Elizabeth wrote, "This book is exactly the kind of book I like, it is a reallistic story with a bit of fantasy." And here is one of her classmates' letters in its entirety:
"I really enjoyed your book, but at the same time it kind of angred me. The reason it did that was, that I'm a person that likes to figure things out. Although at the same time it was very interesting and I lost many hours of sleep staying up and thinking about it not being able to get to sleep. The reason I liked it was that it just left you hanging there and made me want to read more. And it kept the reader thinking all through it. Thank you for writing that story. I had a great time reading it."
Most of the students also wanted to know WHY I had written the book. When I wrote back to the class, I told them in some detail why I was moved to write about a boy who killed, but I couldn't answer their most urgent question: why did Robbie kill Mr. Koh? I also told them how happy it made me to get their letters, even though most of these letters were critical. I told them that authors need readers, especially readers who take the time to discuss and think about their books.
I've been thinking a lot now about the relationship between writers and readers. There is a lot of literary theory on this topic, theory that distinguishes between "writerly" and "readerly" texts, that speculates about how and why readers respond to texts, that probes texts for what they say about their authors or that insists the writer's experiences and state of mind are irrelevant to the resulting work. My son-in-law who is the drama critic for a local free paper said that he turned down a job writing theater reviews for a start-up online publication because he liked seeing his words in print on paper and knowing that his words are getting into 125,000 households every week. He writes for a living but also for the satisfaction of being read.
This blog is read by a handful of my friends and relatives. I think I am writing primarily for my own purposes, to help me clarify what I know and to chronicle some events in my life. I make no pretense of writing in this medium for a wide audience. I don't expect readers to respond, but it is satisfying -- sometimes even thrilling -- when they do.
3 comments:
I think that connection between reader and writer must be one of life's greatest satisfactions--making dopamine spurt out in our brains, according to our friend Theresa Nelson. When a huge controversy erupted over my book and it was being discussed by many, many adults, I LONGED to hear from a child-reader, someone who experienced the book for the story and emotional content. Finally I received a letter from an eight-year-old girl and I knew we had connected; it was the greatest moment.
Thanks for your thoughtful remarks.
Susan Patron
As a blogger and author of several articles and books, it's still thrilling when someone cites one of my works or comments on what I've written. I think this is because writing is mostly an isolated exercise and to realize that someone actually took the time to read what I wrote is just amazing. When I was a doctoral student I wrote an article about the Red Scare and how California librarians reacted. A few years later, Stephen Karetzky, an ultra-conservative (librarian?), included a scathing chapter about my article in his book "Not Seeing Red." It was a nasty piece of work; yet I was amazed that he even had opinions about my work and so immediately bought the book for my collection. Am I a masochist or a fool? BTW, I loved the kid who called you a fool for not writing a more marketable book! When did kids get so clever?
I too lost some hours of sleep puzzling over MEGABOY and worrying about Robby, and wished I had others to discuss it with. Let's hear it for Mr. Hanson for making this book a class project so the kids could try to make sense, or not make sense, of it together. It's what I most love about being in a book group -- being led or pushed beyond where I might comfortably go myself. It makes me very happy to hear of kids getting to have this experience. And to then be able to share their honest reactions with the author, and get her honest responses . . . what could be more exciting and gratifying to a young reader? Or an old one, for that matter.)
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