Kate Jaimet's Blog, page 8
September 8, 2013
Dunces Rock!
Calling all Dunces Anonymous fans!
Are you ready to rock?
I hope so, because next fall, I'll be launching the long-awaited sequel to Dunces Anonymous, a hilarious new comedy called Dunces Rock!
Dunces Rock brings back your favourite characters -- Josh, Wang, Magnolia, Baby Garland, Wilmot Binkle, and Stacey Hogarth -- and adds some new ones for rollicking hijinks and middle-grade mix-ups.
The winter term is starting off badly at Oakview Public School. Principal Hale has cancelled the Drama and Music program, just when Magnolia was preparing to audition for the lead part in Nocturnia, Vampire Princess of Doom, and Wilmot Binkle was planning to learn the electric guitar, far from the prying eyes of his disapproving father. As president of Dunces Anonymous, Josh vows to do everything in his power to bring back the Drama and Music program -- even if it means playing Junior Hockey on Principal Hale’s team with his arch-nemesis, Stacey Hogarth! Can the Dunces defeat the powers of adulthood and save Drama and Music?
In the months leading up to the launch, I'll be posting updates, events, fun games and challenges on this Goodreads blog and on my website, www.katejaimet.com.
To kick things off, why not take the Dunces Rock quiz at:
https://www.goodreads.com/quizzes/295...
The great thing about the quiz is, you can answer all the questions without having read the book (but all the questions connect to the book... it's kind of a teaser).
Enjoy the quiz, and don't forget to check back for more updates on Dunces Rock!
Are you ready to rock?
I hope so, because next fall, I'll be launching the long-awaited sequel to Dunces Anonymous, a hilarious new comedy called Dunces Rock!
Dunces Rock brings back your favourite characters -- Josh, Wang, Magnolia, Baby Garland, Wilmot Binkle, and Stacey Hogarth -- and adds some new ones for rollicking hijinks and middle-grade mix-ups.
The winter term is starting off badly at Oakview Public School. Principal Hale has cancelled the Drama and Music program, just when Magnolia was preparing to audition for the lead part in Nocturnia, Vampire Princess of Doom, and Wilmot Binkle was planning to learn the electric guitar, far from the prying eyes of his disapproving father. As president of Dunces Anonymous, Josh vows to do everything in his power to bring back the Drama and Music program -- even if it means playing Junior Hockey on Principal Hale’s team with his arch-nemesis, Stacey Hogarth! Can the Dunces defeat the powers of adulthood and save Drama and Music?
In the months leading up to the launch, I'll be posting updates, events, fun games and challenges on this Goodreads blog and on my website, www.katejaimet.com.
To kick things off, why not take the Dunces Rock quiz at:
https://www.goodreads.com/quizzes/295...
The great thing about the quiz is, you can answer all the questions without having read the book (but all the questions connect to the book... it's kind of a teaser).
Enjoy the quiz, and don't forget to check back for more updates on Dunces Rock!
July 15, 2013
The Hunger Games - this ain't dystopia, sweetheart
The Hunger Games -- dystopia, right? On the face of it, what could be more dystopian than a bunch of children forced to kill each other? But scratch the surface, and this book is more of a fairy-tale than a dystopia: the story of an unlikely hero who defies impossible odds to emerge unscathed from many trials.
Think of the classic dystopian novel, 1984. What makes it a dystopia is not just the authoritarian society, but the fact that the protagonist's rebellion against that society ultimately fails. Ultimately, Winston Smith betrays the woman he loves, breaks under torture, and lives on as a man whose soul is crushed. That, my friends,is dystopia. Dark, depressing, and unredeemed.
In The Hunger Games, by contrast, Katniss's soul is never crushed. Yes, she lies to Peeta about being in love with him, but that's about as bad as it gets. In the Hunger Games arena, the author cleverly works the plot so that Katniss never has to kill even one single sympathetic character. The only people she kills are the "Careers" -- who are utterly undeveloped as characters and demonized as enemies from the very get-go. (I actually found it quite disturbing how the author dehumanizes these characters, making the readers feel that it is 'okay' for Katniss to kill them, all the while remaining a sympathetic character.)
What if Katniss had been forced to kill Rue in order to come out of the arena alive? What if she had done it? Wouldn't that have made her a less sympathetic character? Wouldn't that have destroyed her soul?
Wouldn't that have been a true dystopia?
Think of the classic dystopian novel, 1984. What makes it a dystopia is not just the authoritarian society, but the fact that the protagonist's rebellion against that society ultimately fails. Ultimately, Winston Smith betrays the woman he loves, breaks under torture, and lives on as a man whose soul is crushed. That, my friends,is dystopia. Dark, depressing, and unredeemed.
In The Hunger Games, by contrast, Katniss's soul is never crushed. Yes, she lies to Peeta about being in love with him, but that's about as bad as it gets. In the Hunger Games arena, the author cleverly works the plot so that Katniss never has to kill even one single sympathetic character. The only people she kills are the "Careers" -- who are utterly undeveloped as characters and demonized as enemies from the very get-go. (I actually found it quite disturbing how the author dehumanizes these characters, making the readers feel that it is 'okay' for Katniss to kill them, all the while remaining a sympathetic character.)
What if Katniss had been forced to kill Rue in order to come out of the arena alive? What if she had done it? Wouldn't that have made her a less sympathetic character? Wouldn't that have destroyed her soul?
Wouldn't that have been a true dystopia?
June 10, 2013
Free Content & the Future of Newspapers
A friend of mine is a web developer for a major urban daily newspaper. The city where he works has about two dozen food trucks, which serve a variety of edibles – from the traditional hot-dogs-and-fries to more exotic salads, wraps and soup -- to the hungry crowds of downtown office workers. So my friend came up with a great idea: why not create an interactive map that would allow readers to see the locations of the various food trucks and, by clicking on each food truck icon, pull up pictures and reviews – submitted by other readers -- of that day’s edible offerings.
Just had a fabulous falafel at #muhammedsmediterraneandelights.
Ugh! Too much salt on #pierrespalatablepoutine.
It may sound like a mundane or trivial idea, but this is the kind of crowd-sourced concept that makes the eyes of today’s cash-strapped newspaper managers light up, because it features the holy grail that they all seek: Free Content.
Of course, it hurts the professional pride of writers (like myself) to think that the content hurriedly texted on his cell phone by some Joe getting lunch at the food truck could be as appealing to readers as our own carefully honed and crafted prose. But that’s irrelevant. All the professional pride in the newsroom plus five bucks will get you a shawarma at Muhammed’s Mediterranean Delights. The executives seeking some kind of business model that will keep traditional media companies afloat in the turbulence of today’s digital ocean couldn’t give the proverbial rat’s ass for their reporters’ professional pride.
And there’s another aspect that makes this idea so appealing. A website like this one is likely to be hugely popular with readers. Imagine you’re a hungry office worker. It’s 12:30 and you’re just thinking about popping down to street level for your lunch break. Why not take a quick peek to see what other people are recommending among today’s street-food offerings? Maybe you’ll even join the conversation and post a picture and review of your own lunch. Lots of people clicking on the site means lots of revenue coming in from digital ads – and everybody’s happy.
Everybody’s happy, that it, until Jane Q. Office Worker posts a comment: “Just got food poisoning from the butter chicken at Muhammed’s Mediterranean Delights. Barfing all afternoon.” People stay away in droves, and Muhammed, who swears there was nothing wrong with his butter chicken, decides to sue for libel. But he won’t sue Jane, who doesn’t have much money. He’ll sue the deep-pocketed news organization that allowed the comment to be posted on its site.
So, for the brilliant idea to work, the newspaper needs to assign someone to vet all the comments that come in – there might be hundreds a day – and post them in near-real time to the website. Of course, the newspaper, which has been cutting back staff for the past decade, doesn’t have such a person readily available, and can’t afford to hire one. But it does have writers (remember those people nursing their wounded pride back in the newsroom). So the managers ask themselves the question: Does it make more financial sense for the newspaper to employ a relatively highly-paid journalist to write, perhaps, one or two food-related stories and reviews a day? Or does it make more sense to employ a lesser-paid intern or junior copyeditor to vet the comments and reviews coming in from dozens or hundreds of readers?
The example of food trucks may seem trivial. But this is a question that strikes at the existential heart of newspapers today.
As newspapers move more and more toward digital platforms, will they continue to be what they have traditionally been: organizations that employ dedicated journalists to investigate and break stories; provide objective coverage of public institutions; report on current news events; write profiles of extraordinary people in our communities; and offer insightful opinion and analysis?
Or, will digital newspapers become curators of vast amounts of crowd-sourced content, content that is more rough around the edges, less crafted and polished, perhaps more biased and error-prone than the stories in traditional newspapers, yet which offers a diversity of views and a speed of reporting impossible to achieve in conventional media models?
I don’t know what the answer is. In fact, I’ve never asked myself the question this bluntly.
But speaking to my web-developer friend, I know it’s a question that all of us -- journalists, editors, and newspaper executives – have to face.
We might as well face it head-on.
Just had a fabulous falafel at #muhammedsmediterraneandelights.
Ugh! Too much salt on #pierrespalatablepoutine.
It may sound like a mundane or trivial idea, but this is the kind of crowd-sourced concept that makes the eyes of today’s cash-strapped newspaper managers light up, because it features the holy grail that they all seek: Free Content.
Of course, it hurts the professional pride of writers (like myself) to think that the content hurriedly texted on his cell phone by some Joe getting lunch at the food truck could be as appealing to readers as our own carefully honed and crafted prose. But that’s irrelevant. All the professional pride in the newsroom plus five bucks will get you a shawarma at Muhammed’s Mediterranean Delights. The executives seeking some kind of business model that will keep traditional media companies afloat in the turbulence of today’s digital ocean couldn’t give the proverbial rat’s ass for their reporters’ professional pride.
And there’s another aspect that makes this idea so appealing. A website like this one is likely to be hugely popular with readers. Imagine you’re a hungry office worker. It’s 12:30 and you’re just thinking about popping down to street level for your lunch break. Why not take a quick peek to see what other people are recommending among today’s street-food offerings? Maybe you’ll even join the conversation and post a picture and review of your own lunch. Lots of people clicking on the site means lots of revenue coming in from digital ads – and everybody’s happy.
Everybody’s happy, that it, until Jane Q. Office Worker posts a comment: “Just got food poisoning from the butter chicken at Muhammed’s Mediterranean Delights. Barfing all afternoon.” People stay away in droves, and Muhammed, who swears there was nothing wrong with his butter chicken, decides to sue for libel. But he won’t sue Jane, who doesn’t have much money. He’ll sue the deep-pocketed news organization that allowed the comment to be posted on its site.
So, for the brilliant idea to work, the newspaper needs to assign someone to vet all the comments that come in – there might be hundreds a day – and post them in near-real time to the website. Of course, the newspaper, which has been cutting back staff for the past decade, doesn’t have such a person readily available, and can’t afford to hire one. But it does have writers (remember those people nursing their wounded pride back in the newsroom). So the managers ask themselves the question: Does it make more financial sense for the newspaper to employ a relatively highly-paid journalist to write, perhaps, one or two food-related stories and reviews a day? Or does it make more sense to employ a lesser-paid intern or junior copyeditor to vet the comments and reviews coming in from dozens or hundreds of readers?
The example of food trucks may seem trivial. But this is a question that strikes at the existential heart of newspapers today.
As newspapers move more and more toward digital platforms, will they continue to be what they have traditionally been: organizations that employ dedicated journalists to investigate and break stories; provide objective coverage of public institutions; report on current news events; write profiles of extraordinary people in our communities; and offer insightful opinion and analysis?
Or, will digital newspapers become curators of vast amounts of crowd-sourced content, content that is more rough around the edges, less crafted and polished, perhaps more biased and error-prone than the stories in traditional newspapers, yet which offers a diversity of views and a speed of reporting impossible to achieve in conventional media models?
I don’t know what the answer is. In fact, I’ve never asked myself the question this bluntly.
But speaking to my web-developer friend, I know it’s a question that all of us -- journalists, editors, and newspaper executives – have to face.
We might as well face it head-on.
May 27, 2013
Trailer? or Trash?
Like many authors, I used to grind my teeth about the ridiculous ratio of "amount-of-time-spent-sitting-on-my-butt-in-front-of-a-computer" vs "number-of-words-written-that-will-actually-make-the-final-manuscript."
But no more. You see, I've just finished filming and editing the one-minute video trailer for my new novel, Break Point
Yes, the entire video is one minute long -- about the time it takes to read half a page of a novel. And I swear, it took me three days to film and two days to edit.
Five days. One minute. Was it worth it?
Will I sound like an idiot if I answer 'yes'?
To tell the truth, I had a blast putting it together. And, not to boast or anything, but I think it's pretty cool. Why don't you be the judge?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOZ-kf...
But no more. You see, I've just finished filming and editing the one-minute video trailer for my new novel, Break Point
Yes, the entire video is one minute long -- about the time it takes to read half a page of a novel. And I swear, it took me three days to film and two days to edit.
Five days. One minute. Was it worth it?
Will I sound like an idiot if I answer 'yes'?
To tell the truth, I had a blast putting it together. And, not to boast or anything, but I think it's pretty cool. Why don't you be the judge?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bOZ-kf...
May 2, 2013
The Next Big Thing
The Next Big Thing
What is The Next Big Thing? Well, it might be a new hit by Rihanna. Or a technological breakthrough to replace dirty oil with clean, green power. Or maybe a peace treaty in the Middle East (that’d be nice).
But on a much, much smaller scale, The Next Big Thing is a global blog tour, started in Australia, to showcase authors and illustrators and their current work. Each author on the tour answers ten questions about his or her next book, then tags the next author.
I was tagged by the wonderful Rachel Eugster, whose Next Big Thing is a picture book called Pocket Mommy. You can read her blog post here. http://suspendedsentences.blogspot.ca/
And now on to my Next Big Thing:
1) What is the working title of your next book?
Break Point
2) Where did the idea come from for the book?
The setting for the book was inspired by a historic tennis club in Ottawa. More broadly, though, the book is about a kid in a struggling middle-class family, trying to compete in a sport where wealth buys a lot of advantages (tennis). It’s inspired in part by the sub-prime mortgage crisis in which a lot of American families lost their homes, and by the growing income gap in North America; the general feeling that wealthy elites act in their own interest, while broader society pays the price.
3) In what genre does your book fall?
It’s a teen sports / mystery novel.
4) What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?
Ok, I seriously do not know any teen actors, so I picked this off of a teen movie fan site on the internet.
Connor: Skandar Keynes because he has a cool name and he looks athletic without being too stereotypically handsome.
Rex: Niall Horan from One Direction, because Rex is supposed to have ‘boy-band” good looks and, hey, Niall is in a boy band. Also, I need a celebrity to sell the movie and who knows? Maybe he can act. Or play tennis. Or both.
5) What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
A teenager struggles to make his way in competitive tennis against a wealthy rival, while uncovering the mysterious vandals who seek to destroy his tennis club.
6) Who is publishing your book?
Orca. It came out May 1st, and is available now in stores and online.
7) How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?
About 2-3 months, once I got started. But it took a while before that to figure out the plot, characters, etc.
8) What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
It has similarities to the other books in the Orca sports series. They all deal with sports and mysteries.
9) Who or what inspired you to write this book?
My husband Mark.
10) What else about the book might pique the reader's interest?
Like all the Orca Sports books, it’s a quick and exciting read, and very accessible to teens who are not avid readers, or who read slightly below their age level.
Want to read more Next Big Things? I’m tagging two other authors:
Karen Avivi writes high-adrenaline teen sports novels. Her latest book, Shredded, is about a girl BMX’er. You go, girl! Check out her blog at:
http://www.karenavivi.com/?page_id=27
Martin Varallo writes and illustrates kids’ books. He’s also a mime and comedian who does a hilarious skit about tennis. What’s not to love?
http://martinvarallo.blogspot.ca/?vie...
What is The Next Big Thing? Well, it might be a new hit by Rihanna. Or a technological breakthrough to replace dirty oil with clean, green power. Or maybe a peace treaty in the Middle East (that’d be nice).
But on a much, much smaller scale, The Next Big Thing is a global blog tour, started in Australia, to showcase authors and illustrators and their current work. Each author on the tour answers ten questions about his or her next book, then tags the next author.
I was tagged by the wonderful Rachel Eugster, whose Next Big Thing is a picture book called Pocket Mommy. You can read her blog post here. http://suspendedsentences.blogspot.ca/
And now on to my Next Big Thing:
1) What is the working title of your next book?
Break Point
2) Where did the idea come from for the book?
The setting for the book was inspired by a historic tennis club in Ottawa. More broadly, though, the book is about a kid in a struggling middle-class family, trying to compete in a sport where wealth buys a lot of advantages (tennis). It’s inspired in part by the sub-prime mortgage crisis in which a lot of American families lost their homes, and by the growing income gap in North America; the general feeling that wealthy elites act in their own interest, while broader society pays the price.
3) In what genre does your book fall?
It’s a teen sports / mystery novel.
4) What actors would you choose to play the part of your characters in a movie rendition?
Ok, I seriously do not know any teen actors, so I picked this off of a teen movie fan site on the internet.
Connor: Skandar Keynes because he has a cool name and he looks athletic without being too stereotypically handsome.
Rex: Niall Horan from One Direction, because Rex is supposed to have ‘boy-band” good looks and, hey, Niall is in a boy band. Also, I need a celebrity to sell the movie and who knows? Maybe he can act. Or play tennis. Or both.
5) What is the one-sentence synopsis of your book?
A teenager struggles to make his way in competitive tennis against a wealthy rival, while uncovering the mysterious vandals who seek to destroy his tennis club.
6) Who is publishing your book?
Orca. It came out May 1st, and is available now in stores and online.
7) How long did it take you to write the first draft of the manuscript?
About 2-3 months, once I got started. But it took a while before that to figure out the plot, characters, etc.
8) What other books would you compare this story to within your genre?
It has similarities to the other books in the Orca sports series. They all deal with sports and mysteries.
9) Who or what inspired you to write this book?
My husband Mark.
10) What else about the book might pique the reader's interest?
Like all the Orca Sports books, it’s a quick and exciting read, and very accessible to teens who are not avid readers, or who read slightly below their age level.
Want to read more Next Big Things? I’m tagging two other authors:
Karen Avivi writes high-adrenaline teen sports novels. Her latest book, Shredded, is about a girl BMX’er. You go, girl! Check out her blog at:
http://www.karenavivi.com/?page_id=27
Martin Varallo writes and illustrates kids’ books. He’s also a mime and comedian who does a hilarious skit about tennis. What’s not to love?
http://martinvarallo.blogspot.ca/?vie...
April 11, 2013
Bad Reviews Are More Fun
Literary critics have often commented that the character of the Devil in Milton's Paradise Lost was much more entertaining than any of the righteous angels floating about, stroking harps and offering sanctimonious commentary.
So it is with book reviews.
I've had bad ones and I've had good ones, and though I'd rather have good ones, I have to admit that the bad ones are more fun.
Recently, my book Break Point got a very good review from CM magazine. http://umanitoba.ca/outreach/cm/vol19/no30/breakpoint.html
The reviewer, Jenice Batiforra, called it "an engaging story filled with vivid descriptions, insightful characters and a fast-paced plot line that will appeal to pre-teen and teen boys."
Thanks, Ms. Batiforra. I'm really glad you liked the book. I'm glad you gave it a good review, because it means that lots of librarians and teachers will read the review and put the book in the hands of readers. A positive review is great news for sales, and good for the ego too.
But a few years ago, another book of mine, Dunces Anonymous, got a much worse review from CM. Reviewer Michelle Superle called it "a schlocky school story" and concluded that "the story's ideological paradoxes and superficiality render (its) message powerless." Ouch. That hurt me for days. It might have even hurt sales of the book (though Dunces went on to become an Official Selection of the 2011 Silver Birch Fiction Award).
Still, I've got to hand it to you, Ms. Superle. "Schlocky school story" is a great line.
I wish I'd thought of it myself.
So it is with book reviews.
I've had bad ones and I've had good ones, and though I'd rather have good ones, I have to admit that the bad ones are more fun.
Recently, my book Break Point got a very good review from CM magazine. http://umanitoba.ca/outreach/cm/vol19/no30/breakpoint.html
The reviewer, Jenice Batiforra, called it "an engaging story filled with vivid descriptions, insightful characters and a fast-paced plot line that will appeal to pre-teen and teen boys."
Thanks, Ms. Batiforra. I'm really glad you liked the book. I'm glad you gave it a good review, because it means that lots of librarians and teachers will read the review and put the book in the hands of readers. A positive review is great news for sales, and good for the ego too.
But a few years ago, another book of mine, Dunces Anonymous, got a much worse review from CM. Reviewer Michelle Superle called it "a schlocky school story" and concluded that "the story's ideological paradoxes and superficiality render (its) message powerless." Ouch. That hurt me for days. It might have even hurt sales of the book (though Dunces went on to become an Official Selection of the 2011 Silver Birch Fiction Award).
Still, I've got to hand it to you, Ms. Superle. "Schlocky school story" is a great line.
I wish I'd thought of it myself.
March 22, 2013
On Irony and the 4-year-old
I witnessed an interesting literary controversy recently in the different reactions of my two daughters, aged 8 and 4, to Jon Scieszka's The Stinky Cheese Man and Other Fairly Stupid Tales.
For those who don't know this book, it's a collection of cynically absurdist retold fairy-tales in which, for example, the Very Ugly Duckling grows up to become a Very Ugly Duck, and the Gingerbread Man is made of stinky cheese, and no-one tries to eat him because he smells disgusting.
I originally got this book out of the library for my 4-year-old, because it looks like a picture book, it's shelved in the picture book section, and picture books are for children aged 3-5, right? In this case, wrong.
As I discovered, a fairy-tale is to a four-year-old as the Bible is to a fundamentalist Christian. It is an Authoritative Text. You do not mess with it. You do not change it. You do not mock it. You do not subvert it. It is, in a word, sacred. When I tried to read the stories in this book to my four-year-old, she refused to listen. She protested loudly, and if you've ever heard a four-year-old protest loudly, you know how bad it can be.
My eight-year-old, however, picked up the book and read it on her own. She devoured it with the same relish as the sly old fox devoured the gingerbread man. She was tickled at the idea of undermining the received wisdom of the fairy tales, of questioning the authority of the Authoritative Text. Irony -- she got it.
It would be interesting to study the development of a sense of irony in children. (Master's psychology thesis, anyone?). But what's interesting to me, as an author, is that despite our post-modern propensity for subversion, a picture book that relies on irony (although it may win awards) is not likely to be a hit with the traditional, 3-to-5-year-old picture book audience.
But perhaps that's a good thing. After all, isn't it nice to know that there's still room in the heart of a four-year-old for an ugly duckling who grows up to be a swan?
For those who don't know this book, it's a collection of cynically absurdist retold fairy-tales in which, for example, the Very Ugly Duckling grows up to become a Very Ugly Duck, and the Gingerbread Man is made of stinky cheese, and no-one tries to eat him because he smells disgusting.
I originally got this book out of the library for my 4-year-old, because it looks like a picture book, it's shelved in the picture book section, and picture books are for children aged 3-5, right? In this case, wrong.
As I discovered, a fairy-tale is to a four-year-old as the Bible is to a fundamentalist Christian. It is an Authoritative Text. You do not mess with it. You do not change it. You do not mock it. You do not subvert it. It is, in a word, sacred. When I tried to read the stories in this book to my four-year-old, she refused to listen. She protested loudly, and if you've ever heard a four-year-old protest loudly, you know how bad it can be.
My eight-year-old, however, picked up the book and read it on her own. She devoured it with the same relish as the sly old fox devoured the gingerbread man. She was tickled at the idea of undermining the received wisdom of the fairy tales, of questioning the authority of the Authoritative Text. Irony -- she got it.
It would be interesting to study the development of a sense of irony in children. (Master's psychology thesis, anyone?). But what's interesting to me, as an author, is that despite our post-modern propensity for subversion, a picture book that relies on irony (although it may win awards) is not likely to be a hit with the traditional, 3-to-5-year-old picture book audience.
But perhaps that's a good thing. After all, isn't it nice to know that there's still room in the heart of a four-year-old for an ugly duckling who grows up to be a swan?
March 14, 2013
The Hidden Depth of Teen Sports Novels
Okay, I know what you're thinking. A deep sports novel? Oxymoron, right? Isn't a sports novel, by definition, as shallow as the stereotypical dumb jock on the football team?
Well, I've been thinking about sports novels lately, since I've written three of them, with the most recent (Break Point) coming out this spring. In particular, I've been thinking about the ways in which novels that superficially revolve around sports can be used to explore other themes.
For example, I love the novel Whale Talk by Chris Crutcher . It's not so much about sports, as it is about sports culture, specifically the jock-worshipping culture in a football-mad high school. In the novel, some particularly oafish guys on the football team, supported by an inflexible school bureaucracy, prevent a mentally-handicapped boy from wearing the varsity letter-jacket of his deceased older brother, a former football player whom he worshipped. The book's hero, T.J., decides to stick it to the jocks by starting a swim team of school misfits, including the offending boy, who undertake to earn their own letter jackets. Is it about sports, or is it about standing up to power? You be the judge.
I also love Alan Cumyn's book Tilt. It's kinda, sorta about a kid trying to make the school basketball team. But the 16-year-old protagonist Stan has more than that going on in his life. For one thing, he feels responsible for his younger brother as his mom copes with a post-divorce mid-life crisis. For another, he’s inexplicably falling in love with Janine Igwash, an outsider-girl whom his best friend thinks is a weirdo and possibly a dyke. Amid this tumult, a well-executed jumpshot represents a kind of mathematical precision and kinetic perfection that Stan searches for, but can’t find, in the rest of his life.
As for my own books, in Edge of Flight, I’ve used the “crux” of a rock climbing route as a metaphor for facing the tough decisions in life. The crux is the hardest move in a route – once you overcome it, the rest becomes easier. Just as the protagonist, Vanisha, must work up her courage to pull the crux of Edge of Flight, she must also find the bravery to make a tough decision in her personal life. For though the decision may be difficult, it will lead to better times ahead.
So next time you pick up a sports novel, have a look for the deeper meaning. It just may be hiding there, like the lucky loonie buried at centre ice (extra points to anyone who gets that Canadian reference!)
Well, I've been thinking about sports novels lately, since I've written three of them, with the most recent (Break Point) coming out this spring. In particular, I've been thinking about the ways in which novels that superficially revolve around sports can be used to explore other themes.
For example, I love the novel Whale Talk by Chris Crutcher . It's not so much about sports, as it is about sports culture, specifically the jock-worshipping culture in a football-mad high school. In the novel, some particularly oafish guys on the football team, supported by an inflexible school bureaucracy, prevent a mentally-handicapped boy from wearing the varsity letter-jacket of his deceased older brother, a former football player whom he worshipped. The book's hero, T.J., decides to stick it to the jocks by starting a swim team of school misfits, including the offending boy, who undertake to earn their own letter jackets. Is it about sports, or is it about standing up to power? You be the judge.
I also love Alan Cumyn's book Tilt. It's kinda, sorta about a kid trying to make the school basketball team. But the 16-year-old protagonist Stan has more than that going on in his life. For one thing, he feels responsible for his younger brother as his mom copes with a post-divorce mid-life crisis. For another, he’s inexplicably falling in love with Janine Igwash, an outsider-girl whom his best friend thinks is a weirdo and possibly a dyke. Amid this tumult, a well-executed jumpshot represents a kind of mathematical precision and kinetic perfection that Stan searches for, but can’t find, in the rest of his life.
As for my own books, in Edge of Flight, I’ve used the “crux” of a rock climbing route as a metaphor for facing the tough decisions in life. The crux is the hardest move in a route – once you overcome it, the rest becomes easier. Just as the protagonist, Vanisha, must work up her courage to pull the crux of Edge of Flight, she must also find the bravery to make a tough decision in her personal life. For though the decision may be difficult, it will lead to better times ahead.
So next time you pick up a sports novel, have a look for the deeper meaning. It just may be hiding there, like the lucky loonie buried at centre ice (extra points to anyone who gets that Canadian reference!)
Kate Jaimet's Blog
Humour & insights on the writing life, plus updates on my writing projects and events. I like to keep it short and snappy, so hang around for a couple of 'graphs, and let's talk lit.
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