Brewster

Slouka, Mark. Brewster. New York: Norton. 2013. Print

First Sentences:

The first time I saw him fight was right in front of the school, winter.

It was before I knew him. I noticed him walking across the parking lot -- that long coat, his hair tossing around in the wind -- with some guy I'd never seen before following twenty feet behind and two others fanned back like wings on a jet.

Description:

For years, The Catcher in the Rye has been thrust on teens in school as the ultimate coming of age and angst novel. Now, a new contender is available and for my money, vastly superior to Catcher on every level: writing, characters, dialogue, and situations. That book is Brewster by Mark Slouka.

Brewster, New York, 1968, is the setting for this fictional memoir of 16-year-old Jon and his friends Ray, Frank, and Karen. Each has his/her own difficulties in their lives, particularly with their parents who are either devoutly religious, abusive, or prefer to simply ignore the existence of their teenager.  

Young adults dealing with these challenges as well as the usual trials of teen years is not an unusual theme for a novel. What separates Brewster from similar books, including The Catcher in the Rye, is the honesty of emotion, the grittiness of the environment, the realistic everyday challenges, and the heartfelt dialogue among these teens. They rarely reveal their true feelings to their friends, preferring to avoid embarrassment or the possibility of standing out, just as teens do in every era. But slowly, slowly, their histories and innermost thoughts and desires are uncovered. They are friends while still very separate individuals. Their shared goal is to find out what really matters, and also what does not.

Readers will strongly feel the isolation and insecurities of narrator Jon as he deals with parents who blame him for the accidental death of his infant brother and ignore him completely. He is smart, but disinterested in school and life. His heroes are Tommie Smith and John Carlos, carrying a photo of them on the Olympic platform as they defiantly raised their gloved fists. Jon's efforts on his cross-country team provide an outlet for his dogged energy and desire to prove his worth.

Ray is another story. A fighter, a loner, a problem in school who lives with his ex-cop father and comes to school with bruises from fights he takes on to earn money or stand up against an insult. The friendship of Ray and Jon, total opposites, is slow to develop but realistic in its portrayal. 

Frank, another loner and gentle giant of a kid, joins this pair for lunch one day just to have a place to sit. Little is said among them, a completely accurate depiction of boys sitting together at lunch in my experience. Eventually, new transfer Karen becomes a part of the group, particularly after she and Ray (to Jon's consternation) become an item.

So it's love, friendship, isolation, insecurity, and challenges that outline this book. But what holds it together is the writing: strong, honest, and breathtakingly memorable. Some examples?

• The coffee table was covered with bottle rings like the Olympics gone crazy;
• [after watching a father hit his daughter] It seemed acted, unreal. I'd never rally seen what people could do to each other;
• It was like something out of a shampoo commercial, only real: a wooden cabin at the bottom of a stone staircase set into a hill, a small, still lake alive with the rings of fish like a slow rain;
• [watching a woman swimming] I watched her moving under the surface, ghostly, familiar, parting the water like she was squeezing through a row of narrow windows;
• For a few weeks I went out with a girl, Abby Fisher, who had beautiful dark bangs that shone like wood in old houses;
• [on the military draft] We were all standing on a conveyer belt gliding toward a cliff, smoking, laughing, and nobody wanted to be the first to say it;
• The holidays slid by like a stone over ice, leaving nothing much to remember.

The plot is strong, real, and consuming. It is gritty, so not for the faint-hearted looking for peaches and songbirds of innocence. Giving away any of the plot away would lessen your own experience with this novel. Just grab it, sit back, and enjoy the writing and characters.

I can honestly say that this is one of the top books I have read this year, one I feel will last for many years as the most believable portrayal of teenagers facing the challenges of families, friends, and everyday life. 

Quality writing, character, and plot are still available in today's literature. Don't settle for anything less than Brewster. Get it right now and you won't be disappointed. 


Happy reading. 

Fred

www.firstsentencereader.blogspot.com

Comments

Previous posts

____________________

If this book interests you, be sure to check out:

Lewis, Michael. The Blind Side: Evolution of a Game  

Very different story from Brewster, yet it tells the true events of a teen of the streets who gets a break to secure an education and a career in football.

Chbosky, Stephen. The Perks of Being a Wallflower  

Another coming of age story of life among teens, although this one is particularly well-written.