Trevor Shane's Blog, page 2
July 23, 2011
Children of Paranoia Reviews
I'm trying to post reviews here from reviewers who don't post on Goodreads so that everyone can get a full view of various people's reaction to Children of Paranoia.
I'm really excited about this review from Blood Rose Books: "I can use one word to describe this book, GRIPPING. I cannot say how much I loved this book. It is a fantastic debut, one of the best that I have read this year. It had me on the edge of my seat the whole time..." - http://j9books.blogspot.com/2011/07/t...
I'm really excited about this review from Blood Rose Books: "I can use one word to describe this book, GRIPPING. I cannot say how much I loved this book. It is a fantastic debut, one of the best that I have read this year. It had me on the edge of my seat the whole time..." - http://j9books.blogspot.com/2011/07/t...
May 2, 2011
Children of Paranoia Reviews
"Trevor Shane's debut novel is one non-stop adrenaline rush that keeps you on edge to the very climax. The plot left me absolutely breathless in anticipation for what would happen next." - Game Vortex (http://www.gamevortex.com/gamevortex/...)
April 28, 2011
One Writer's Influences...
Every writer has their influences: parents, authors, friends, specific books and, of course, teachers. I wanted to write a little about one of the people who influenced me to become a writer. Hopefully a few people will indulge me and read about the influence one great teacher had on me.
I went to a public high school in New Jersey. I was a good student, though far from extraordinary. I think I could have been a better student if I life didn't offer so many distractions from my studies. Friends, girls, sports, music, books--they all seemed so much more relevant than anything that they were trying to teach me at school.
I probably slept through most of my classes during my freshman year of high school. The nights simply offered too much distraction. I'd stay up until two or three o'clock every night talking to friends on the phone, listening to music or reading books (books I liked, not books they made me read). By the time I got to school the following day, I could do little more than put my head down on my desk. Trying to keep my eyes open was a I fight I rarely won. My classes seemed pointless. I remember my freshman year history class with its dull as a spoon textbook and weekly multiple choice or true/false quizzes (which I cheated on, like everybody else).
Little changed from freshman year to sophomore year except that my history teacher no longer entered the teaching profession specifically for the opportunity to become an assistant coach on the high school football team. No, now my history teacher was a white-haired old coot who'd been teaching at for an eternity. "White-haired old coot" isn't my term. It's the the self-deprecating way Mr. Berry used to refer to himself. It was accurate though, he was old and wrinkled and his hair was perfectly void of any color accept the tint of the yellow chalk he used when writing on the chalkboard. The class was different too. Gone were the weekly multiple choice tests. Gone was the boring textbook. Mr. Berry had been teaching at that school for long enough that they let him teach history his way. In lieu of the textbook Mr. Berry had us read articles from newspapers and magazines. He encouraged us to read primary sources. He showed us movies and tried to get us to talk about history.
Despite the uniqueness of his efforts, Mr. Berry was still teaching teenagers. I still spent my days trying to catch up on the sleep I'd missed the night before. I still put my head down on my desk, even in Mr. Berry's class, and dozed off. The only days when I wouldn't sleep were the days when Mr. Berry showed movies. I didn't stay awake during the classes when movies were shown because I thought the movies were good. I stayed awake during those classes because Mr. Berry would stand behind my desk throughout the movie with his foot hooked into the basket under my desk and, every time my head began to drop towards my desk, he'd rattle the desk with his foot until my head bounced upright again. When the class ended, I'd leave, more tired than I was when I came, and Mr. Berry wouldn't say a word to me.
One day Mr. Berry gave us an assignment to write a report on the painfully boring (to me at the time) subject of pre-revolutionary war colonial life. I could hardly imagine a less exciting topic. I procrastinated. The night before the report was due, I still hadn't done any research. So, instead of writing a report, I wrote a historical fiction short story (relating to the Zenger trial and the origins of free speech in America; I can't believe I can still remember the topic). I had no idea how Mr. Berry would react to my story, void of footnotes and very nearly void of facts. The day after we handed in our papers, Mr. Berry asked to see me after class. Like any good semi-delinquent fourteen-year-old, I had my mentally prepared remarks that I would never in a million years have the courage to deliver. I imagined myself calling Mr. Berry a hypocrite and telling him that his class was a joke and that he was, indeed, just "a white-haired old coot" who didn't understand his students. I was prepared to be scolded. I was prepared to have my creativity discouraged.
I wasn't prepared for what I got instead. Encouragement. Mr. Berry told me that he thought my story was very good and that it showed promise. He became one of the first people to ever tell me that I had knack for writing. That white-haired old coot saw an opportunity to get through to an otherwise listless kid and he didn't miss a beat. He didn't tell me that I was gifted or that my writing was fantastic. That would have been too much. Instead, he told me that my story was good and that I should keep on writing.
It would be nice to say that everything changed after that moment but one moment rarely changes everything. A few things did change though. I still slept through most of my classes but I rarely slept through Mr. Berry's. We started becoming close. I wrote more under his encouragement and he continued to ask me about my writing. I had him again junior year and our relationship stayed strong. He was the teacher that I could talk to, the teacher that actually went out of his way to talk to me. He gave me advice about where I should go to college. He said that I should go to a school in a city where people, real people, live. He said that I needed to make conscious efforts not to shelter myself from the world. His was the only advice that I took when I applied to colleges.
One day during the spring of my junior year of high school, I walked into my first period math class. It was quiet and a little cold. I was one of the first people in the classroom and I sat down at my desk. I sat there. Then I saw Mike Schubert, one of my two close friends in the class, walk in. He looked pale, almost sick. He didn't throw me his normal hello. Instead, he walked up to me and began to speak. His voice was shaking. He was scared, afraid to tell me what he'd heard. "Mr. Berry died last night," he told me, his voice trembling. I didn't believe him. He wasn't the type to ever lie but I assumed he'd just heard a horrible rumor. I sat at my desk, barely able to move. Five minutes later an announcement came over the loudspeaker confirming what my friend Mike had just told me. Mr. Berry caught pneumonia over the weekend and had died suddenly in his sleep. I sat at my desk and cried.
The school had a tear-filled memorial for Mr. Berry a few weeks later. I wasn't the only student who loved Mr. Berry. One of the art teachers sculpted a statute in Mr. Berry's honor which they erected behind the school.
So there it was, the one teacher who had truly encouraged my writing had died. Though none of his students knew it, we found out a shortly after the memorial that Mr. Berry was planning on retiring at the end of the school year. As his final class, Mr. Berry had prepared gifts for all of us. The teacher who replaced him handed out the gifts shortly before the year ended. He gave a number of us a copy of Life's Little Instruction Book. Considering the fact that he died months before the end of the year, I was surprise to find an inscription inside my book. It read: "Trevor, of all my students, you will probably enjoy this book the most" before referring me to a specific page of the book instructing me to remember to call my mother. The inscription ended with the simple phrase, written in Mr. Berry's loopy script, "Stick with writing."
Like I said, I eventually took Mr. Berry's advice when applying to colleges. I went to school in a city. I mentioned him in my year book. I thought about him frequently. I did everything but write. Years went by. I graduated college. I got a job. I got married. I moved, once twice, four times. Everywhere I moved I kept Life's Little Instruction Book on my bookshelf though I rarely took and down to read the inscription.
Then I turned thirty. A few days after I turned thirty, I took the little book off the shelf and read the note the white-haired old coot wrote to me over a decade earlier. I realized it was now or never. I sat down and started writing again. Mr. Berry's influence on me never left. I fought it sometimes, dozing on him just like I'd done when I was his student, but it never left. He was the best teacher, and one of the best friends, I ever had.
My first novel, Children of Paranoia, is being published on September 8, 2011 by Dutton. I'm not sure that the book is exactly what Mr. Berry would have expected when he encouraged me to stick with writing but I'm pretty sure what he would say if he had a chance to read it. He would say the same thing he said to me when I was fifteen, "This is really good. You should keep on writing."
I take Life's Little Instruction Book down off my bookshelf frequently now just to reread the inscription. The thing that I'm most proud of about getting published is simply that I gave it a shot and, in the end, I didn't let Mr. Berry down. God knows he never let me down.
Oh, and I always remember to call my mother.
Thanks for everything Mr. Berry.
I went to a public high school in New Jersey. I was a good student, though far from extraordinary. I think I could have been a better student if I life didn't offer so many distractions from my studies. Friends, girls, sports, music, books--they all seemed so much more relevant than anything that they were trying to teach me at school.
I probably slept through most of my classes during my freshman year of high school. The nights simply offered too much distraction. I'd stay up until two or three o'clock every night talking to friends on the phone, listening to music or reading books (books I liked, not books they made me read). By the time I got to school the following day, I could do little more than put my head down on my desk. Trying to keep my eyes open was a I fight I rarely won. My classes seemed pointless. I remember my freshman year history class with its dull as a spoon textbook and weekly multiple choice or true/false quizzes (which I cheated on, like everybody else).
Little changed from freshman year to sophomore year except that my history teacher no longer entered the teaching profession specifically for the opportunity to become an assistant coach on the high school football team. No, now my history teacher was a white-haired old coot who'd been teaching at for an eternity. "White-haired old coot" isn't my term. It's the the self-deprecating way Mr. Berry used to refer to himself. It was accurate though, he was old and wrinkled and his hair was perfectly void of any color accept the tint of the yellow chalk he used when writing on the chalkboard. The class was different too. Gone were the weekly multiple choice tests. Gone was the boring textbook. Mr. Berry had been teaching at that school for long enough that they let him teach history his way. In lieu of the textbook Mr. Berry had us read articles from newspapers and magazines. He encouraged us to read primary sources. He showed us movies and tried to get us to talk about history.
Despite the uniqueness of his efforts, Mr. Berry was still teaching teenagers. I still spent my days trying to catch up on the sleep I'd missed the night before. I still put my head down on my desk, even in Mr. Berry's class, and dozed off. The only days when I wouldn't sleep were the days when Mr. Berry showed movies. I didn't stay awake during the classes when movies were shown because I thought the movies were good. I stayed awake during those classes because Mr. Berry would stand behind my desk throughout the movie with his foot hooked into the basket under my desk and, every time my head began to drop towards my desk, he'd rattle the desk with his foot until my head bounced upright again. When the class ended, I'd leave, more tired than I was when I came, and Mr. Berry wouldn't say a word to me.
One day Mr. Berry gave us an assignment to write a report on the painfully boring (to me at the time) subject of pre-revolutionary war colonial life. I could hardly imagine a less exciting topic. I procrastinated. The night before the report was due, I still hadn't done any research. So, instead of writing a report, I wrote a historical fiction short story (relating to the Zenger trial and the origins of free speech in America; I can't believe I can still remember the topic). I had no idea how Mr. Berry would react to my story, void of footnotes and very nearly void of facts. The day after we handed in our papers, Mr. Berry asked to see me after class. Like any good semi-delinquent fourteen-year-old, I had my mentally prepared remarks that I would never in a million years have the courage to deliver. I imagined myself calling Mr. Berry a hypocrite and telling him that his class was a joke and that he was, indeed, just "a white-haired old coot" who didn't understand his students. I was prepared to be scolded. I was prepared to have my creativity discouraged.
I wasn't prepared for what I got instead. Encouragement. Mr. Berry told me that he thought my story was very good and that it showed promise. He became one of the first people to ever tell me that I had knack for writing. That white-haired old coot saw an opportunity to get through to an otherwise listless kid and he didn't miss a beat. He didn't tell me that I was gifted or that my writing was fantastic. That would have been too much. Instead, he told me that my story was good and that I should keep on writing.
It would be nice to say that everything changed after that moment but one moment rarely changes everything. A few things did change though. I still slept through most of my classes but I rarely slept through Mr. Berry's. We started becoming close. I wrote more under his encouragement and he continued to ask me about my writing. I had him again junior year and our relationship stayed strong. He was the teacher that I could talk to, the teacher that actually went out of his way to talk to me. He gave me advice about where I should go to college. He said that I should go to a school in a city where people, real people, live. He said that I needed to make conscious efforts not to shelter myself from the world. His was the only advice that I took when I applied to colleges.
One day during the spring of my junior year of high school, I walked into my first period math class. It was quiet and a little cold. I was one of the first people in the classroom and I sat down at my desk. I sat there. Then I saw Mike Schubert, one of my two close friends in the class, walk in. He looked pale, almost sick. He didn't throw me his normal hello. Instead, he walked up to me and began to speak. His voice was shaking. He was scared, afraid to tell me what he'd heard. "Mr. Berry died last night," he told me, his voice trembling. I didn't believe him. He wasn't the type to ever lie but I assumed he'd just heard a horrible rumor. I sat at my desk, barely able to move. Five minutes later an announcement came over the loudspeaker confirming what my friend Mike had just told me. Mr. Berry caught pneumonia over the weekend and had died suddenly in his sleep. I sat at my desk and cried.
The school had a tear-filled memorial for Mr. Berry a few weeks later. I wasn't the only student who loved Mr. Berry. One of the art teachers sculpted a statute in Mr. Berry's honor which they erected behind the school.
So there it was, the one teacher who had truly encouraged my writing had died. Though none of his students knew it, we found out a shortly after the memorial that Mr. Berry was planning on retiring at the end of the school year. As his final class, Mr. Berry had prepared gifts for all of us. The teacher who replaced him handed out the gifts shortly before the year ended. He gave a number of us a copy of Life's Little Instruction Book. Considering the fact that he died months before the end of the year, I was surprise to find an inscription inside my book. It read: "Trevor, of all my students, you will probably enjoy this book the most" before referring me to a specific page of the book instructing me to remember to call my mother. The inscription ended with the simple phrase, written in Mr. Berry's loopy script, "Stick with writing."
Like I said, I eventually took Mr. Berry's advice when applying to colleges. I went to school in a city. I mentioned him in my year book. I thought about him frequently. I did everything but write. Years went by. I graduated college. I got a job. I got married. I moved, once twice, four times. Everywhere I moved I kept Life's Little Instruction Book on my bookshelf though I rarely took and down to read the inscription.
Then I turned thirty. A few days after I turned thirty, I took the little book off the shelf and read the note the white-haired old coot wrote to me over a decade earlier. I realized it was now or never. I sat down and started writing again. Mr. Berry's influence on me never left. I fought it sometimes, dozing on him just like I'd done when I was his student, but it never left. He was the best teacher, and one of the best friends, I ever had.
My first novel, Children of Paranoia, is being published on September 8, 2011 by Dutton. I'm not sure that the book is exactly what Mr. Berry would have expected when he encouraged me to stick with writing but I'm pretty sure what he would say if he had a chance to read it. He would say the same thing he said to me when I was fifteen, "This is really good. You should keep on writing."
I take Life's Little Instruction Book down off my bookshelf frequently now just to reread the inscription. The thing that I'm most proud of about getting published is simply that I gave it a shot and, in the end, I didn't let Mr. Berry down. God knows he never let me down.
Oh, and I always remember to call my mother.
Thanks for everything Mr. Berry.
