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Aug 31, 2010

Tatiana rated it:

I didn't know this novel was written in verse when I borrowed it from my library, but no matter, I love the format and David Levithan certainly has solid poetry-writing skills.

The Realm of Possibility is a collection of 20 stories told by the students of the same school, each written in its distinct voice and style - song lyrics, linebroken prose, free verse, etc.

These stories and lives are interconnected in very interesting and often unconventional ways. It is a pleasan More...

8 comments like (5 people liked it)

Apr 29, 2008

Claudia rated it:

OMG! Levithan is a genius. This book, a novel in verse, has 20 narrators, all students at the same high school. Each tells his or her own story, and they all are inter-related. Some are friends, some are enemies, some are romantic interests. As always, Levithan includes gay and lesbian characters with respect and affection. Each student has a distinctive voice and we grow to love all of them. To fully see the relationships, I created a chart to show whose story was whose, who they liked and didn More...

1 comment like (7 people liked it)

Jul 19, 2010

Derek rated it:

This collection of poems and prose was tender and sweet and wonderful. As I read these stories I could hear the voices in the hallway. The goth, the metal head, the bible toter, the bitchy popular girl, etc. I wanted to know who these kids were and who they were talking about. What is great bout Levithan is that he let's you know who the characters are speaking of and then you can find out his/her point of view. Haven't we all felt at least one of these emotions? Dealt with love? Loss? I would l More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 11, 2011

Sarah (Y.A. Love) rated it:

I’m a huge fan of David Levithan’s work. Until The Realm of Possibility I’ve only read one of David’s stand-alone books- Boy Meets Boy. I’ve read many of his dual-author books like Nick and Norah’s Infinite Playlist, Naomi and Ely’s No Kiss List, and Will Grayson, Will Grayson. His characters are always honest, witty and laugh-out-loud funny. The Realm of Possibility shows a much different side to David’s writing ability. It shows a writing ability and style that makes me want more (not tha More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Nov 22, 2007

Alarra rated it:

I actually liked this quite a bit, but the low rating is for the unwieldy format. It's 20 interrelated prose-poems, each from a different character's POV, and as the book progresses we pick up different plotlines through hints back to earlier events in earlier poems (though some go nowhere, and that really annoyed me). The poems are a bit hit and miss in quality, and the stories they tell are the same, but there's a lot of heart in the characters. I particularly liked Anton and Gail's story - More...

1 comment like (1 person liked it)

Jan 29, 2012

Richie rated it:

28 November 2003 THE REALM OF POSSIBILITY by David Levithan, Random House/Knopf, August 2004, ISBN 0-375-82845-1

"...I want to be strong I want to laugh along
I want to belong to the living
Alive, alive, I want to get up and jive
I want to wreck my stockings in some juke box dive
Do you want - do you want - do you want
To dance with me baby
Do you want to take a chance
On maybe finding some sweet romance with me baby
Well, come on..."
--Joni More...

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Jan 13, 2012

Caroline rated it:

I don't know how David Levithan does it. But he does.

This book may look odd at first. You flip through the pages and find that it looks more like a collection of poetry than a novel. But that's the beauty of it. The unique quirkiness of it that allows for 210 pages of words floating along a river of human emotions. Or something like that.

I found myself trying to keep track of the name of the character while reading each poem-like prose. But as I went on, I realized I didn't More...

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Dec 23, 2011

Colby rated it:

How to describe this book...
It's about a bunch of people.
Who go to the same school. And they talk about stuff. So much is covered in this book, such as eating disorders, boys who feel the need to be big and strong, sex, homosexuality, and all that jazz. There are 20 different voices, one for each 'chapter'. Basically, the reason this gets such a low rating is that the characters would each talk for about ten pages (which, in verse, isn't very much.) and then it would move on to the n More...

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Dec 17, 2011

Christina (Reading Thru The Night) rated it:

the realm of possibility (all lowercase, peeps) is a novel of twelve teens all written individually in poetry as prose. Each chapter opens with the names of four different characters and their stories follow. You've got the chick who loves Holden Caulfield and her boyfriend who is just over it because OBVIOUSLY he cannot compete. You've got the gay teen who found love for the first time and is about to celebrate a first anniversary... (OR) one of my favorites, the girl who goes from writing on h More...

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Nov 14, 2011

Chelsea rated it:

When I bought this novel I didn't realize it didn't have just one narrator. In fact, this book has twenty different narrators. But David Levithan does an amazing job of keeping each of their stories separate, easy to follow, and each with a completely different and moving style of writing. In the future, his ability to make so many complex characters, each with an equally strong voice, will be something I turn towards when trying to write anything from alternating points of view. Since all the n More...

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Sep 06, 2011

dee rated it:

This review has been hidden because it contains spoilers. To view it, click here

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 28, 2011

Chelsey rated it:

This book is purely amazing. I got it because of the cover, honestly, and then I looked inside and just skimmed a few pages and saw that it wasn't what I thought it might be. It wasn't the normal formatting for a book. Some of it was written like a poem. Some in small paragraphs, some had single words in one line. So it intrigued me.

I started reading and I made it through the book in no time. It's really a thick book for the small amount of writing inside of it. It wasn't all that grea More...

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Mar 22, 2011

Alana rated it:

David Levithan has done it again. He has written about a large spectrum of topics that most authors shy away from. After reading several of his novels I have found a common theme of homosexuality. This book is filled with poems written from the standpoint of teenagers. These twenty or so teens write about subjects that teens face everyday, in every city, of every state, in every country around the world. Teenage love,homosexuality, smoking, alcohol,peer rivalry and peer pressure. Who hasn't More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Mar 22, 2011

Mikey T rated it:

Getting what you want is just as difficult as not getting what you want. Because then you have to figure out what to do with it instead of figuring out what to do without it.
The Realm of Possibility is a novel that uses free verse to allow us into a realm of characters that are looking to discover themselves through love.
A lot of this book has to do with finding out one’s identity. From the girl who wants to find herself after being hit in the face with a lunch tray to the messa More...

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Mar 21, 2011

Jennifer rated it:

"Here's what I know about the realm of possibility-- it is alwys expanding, it is never what you think it is.Everything around us was once deemed impossible...And yet, every day we each do so many things that were once impossible to us." This book is filled with poems straight from the mind of teenagers. These twenty or so youths write many poems about pressing topics on the mind of teenagers everywhere. The subjects of their work include: teenage love, peer pressure, homosexuality, sm More...

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Mar 21, 2011

Joshua rated it:

The Realm of Possibility is a slice of a tall cake. You can see the stacked layers, the parts that make up the total construct. Some of the stories were excellent, giving a detailed look into the lives and thoughts of seemingly real adolescents. Others were merely mediocre, spinning predictable anecdotes or running a full head of steam into nothing at all. In a way, the latter parts fit with some aspects of growing up, though that is a stretch to assume that it will be understood that way by More...

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Mar 21, 2011

Andrea rated it:

This series of vignettes on the lives of everyday students at a high school is written in free verse from each student's perspective. Through their individual story, you can begin to understand how their life intersects with the other students who are telling their own story. This in depth look at the lives of teenagers and their triumphs and tribulations could have been about any teenager anywhere. All teenagers should read this book. All students will be able to relate to one or more of the More...

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Mar 11, 2011

Rachel rated it:

The Realm of Possibility is a novel of poems written by several different students who are connected by the same high school. Throughout the novel, it becomes clear that each story is intertwined with others in the book. In this way, it almost seems as if the reader is able to quietly peek through the journals of several of the students in a single high school and learn about the trials and tribulations facing each student.

I can appreciate the creative genius of this text. In fact, I'v More...

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Mar 09, 2011

Kristen rated it:

I rated the realm of possibilty as a two-star because most of the time I was not into the book. I found myself just reading to get through the assignmet and I was thrilled how quickly that happened (less than two hours). I felt disconnected from the characters so I did not get into the story, but I greatly appreciate some of the conventions the author used. The fact that he was able to swtich back and forth between point of views from and you get each individual characters insight is really More...

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Dec 06, 2010

Jessica rated it:

The Realm of Possibility is poetry. Probably like any volume of poetry, some of it is top notch, and some of it is terrible. I thought more of it was terrible than top notch. I also thought another problem with the poems was that the characters the poems were about/written by were supposed to interlock. They didn't always do that, at least not clearly. I also get irritated because David Levithan seems to exist on the same sappy, unrealistic cloud the guy who wrote Perks of Being A Wallflower l More...

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Jul 19, 2010

God rated it:

In twenty poems in twenty different voices and styles, this book lays out what it means to be a teenager. Loves are begun, continued, and ended, friendships are formed, changed, and lost. The characters’ stories intersect and merge in expected and unexpected ways, and out of twenty different stories, one complete picture emerges of the relationships bred among a high school class. Themes include fitting in and breaking out, friends, family relationships, body image, religion, sex and most freque More...

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Jul 18, 2010

Beth rated it:

Through poetic free verse monologues, David Levithan creates emotional voices of twenty teenagers that reflect experiences often profound but frequently overlooked. Each character in The Realm of Possibility provides insight that articulately communicates the subtleties of relationships, between couples, friends and family. David is in love with a boy named Jed, and the quiet moments they have together, sharing cigarettes, hold profound romantic intensity considering the simplicity of this exper More...

1 comment like

Jul 17, 2010

Kristyn rated it:

I loved this book and it is an especially great read for a young adult reader. The different forms of poetry were beautifully done and captured the personality and emotion of each of the characters. This book was done using the perspective of 20 different high school students, each at a crossroads in their lives. Each of the characters had their own voice and were so believable I felt like I was in High School again suffering through the turmoil of adolescence. The author also beautifully incorp More...

0 comments like (1 person liked it)

Jul 14, 2010

Sandra rated it:

At first I had a hard time getting into the novel. I felt confused after the first chapter because I wanted to keep reading about the boy and Jed. I didn't know that the names at the beginning of each section related to the narrators of the different sections. As soon as I picked that up, the novel was less confusing in terms of who was narrating. However, I did find it a bit frustrating that few of the chracters actually had any resolution to their problems. I wanted to read the ending for More...

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Feb 23, 2010

stephanie rated it:

this book is a fantastic work of art.

20 separate people, united in this book, tell a story that is more than just about them, but about their school, society, friendship, love, and being a teenager.

i was very skeptical when i picked this up because usually verse-books don't do it for me. however, since this is my trip of reading David Levithan, i opened it. and man, am i ever glad!

it works kind of like a mystery - who is talking to who, who's name is what, how ev More...

0 comments like (2 people liked it)

Nov 09, 2009

Beth rated it:

This novel in verse is strong and diverse, with clever turns of phrase and interesting connected characters that keep it from being mediocre. The story follows a group of students through their daily lives, tinged with assorted teen angst and beauty: a dying mom, a multicultural romance, love, consummated and unrequited. Grouped into sets, each section lists the voices that contribute to the section, and Levithan deftly conveys each speaker without naming him or her.

Occassionally the More...

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May 14, 2009

Sydney rated it:

Sometimes we share common experiences as well as interests with people and don't even know it. In The Realm of Possibility by David Levithan, David explains this theory throughout this book filled with monologues in poem form. Each poem describes a a short snippet of twenty teens lives who all go to the same high school.The funny part about this book is that all of the characters stories in the book interconnect with each other. The twenty teens in monologues do not realize that they sh More...

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Jul 03, 2011

Melanie rated it:

This is one of the most beautifully crafted books i've read in my lifetime. If you know a young adult or mature young teen who is confused about their identity or normalcy, i recommend this book. it features all types of characters, personalities, and disorders- one gay and one lesbian couple, an anorexic girl with a man who is afraid to be seen as effeminate, a punk-rocker who falls in love with a bible-thumper, a girl who writes degrading messages on herself and writes semi-threatening message More...

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Apr 01, 2010

Molly rated it:

Take Spoon River Anthology and change the setting to a contemporary American high school, and you get this book. Twenty teens tell their stories, their thoughts, their feelings about themselves and one another through poetry. Boyfriends and girlfriend and best friends and former friends and potential friends and brothers and sisters and people who have never spoken a word to one another. Each voice is different, the writing styles vary, but one thing remains true throughout: no matter how alo More...

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Jul 23, 2010

Michael rated it:

5Q, 3P, J/S: Writing almost entirely in verse, Levithan artfully relates the story of twenty fictional high school students in their own words. Each of the five chapters includes entries by four students. Each student’s contribution has the feel of a journal entry, telling their story from a deeply personal perspective. The students’ entries take various forms; from song lyrics, to highly structured poetry, to a humorously desperate rant by a boy whose girlfriend loves Holden Caulfield far too More...

2 comments like (1 person liked it)

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