_A Long Way Down_, Jason Reynolds
Mar. 3rd, 2020 02:35 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
walkitoutHey, short form here, for a book that is not long: go get it and read it. It is absolutely worth it in every way shape and form.
This was our February book group selection. We had our discussion on March, because we delayed it from the 3rd Monday because of February vacation week and then on the 4th Monday there was a meeting in town about the school co-op. Anyway. We met. It was a really nice discussion and we all loved the book.
It is in verse, so that is unusual. But it has a delightful rhythm that is subtle and draws the reader in.
It is not a graphic novel, but there is a grey pattern on the pages that depicts (I presume) the accumulating smoke in the elevator as the protagonist progressively sees what was at first an incredibly black and white decision turn into something so grey and foggy that it is almost impossible to know what to do at all. It is subtle, and the layering of it is delightful, and it does not bog me down the way graphic novels and the difficulty of deciphering paneled depictions sometimes can for me.
It is about a difficult topic, that is both very specific (Tupac and Biggie help nail down the approximate time and place, as does the absence of cell phones, the uncle whose “office” was a streetcorner payphone when selling crack initially to get enough money to replace a video camera) and very universal: the problems that confront boys becoming young men, in an environment in which many if not all of the adults participate in extra-legal activities and thus cannot rely upon standard dispute resolution mechanisms (calling the cops, suing in court, etc.) but must instead protect their own territory, their own people, their own honor.
Super, super fantastic book, very clear, which presents a moral conundrum forthrightly, without any preaching. It is a sharp and hard thing to think about with an urgent need for an answer that probably cannot be simple.
This was our February book group selection. We had our discussion on March, because we delayed it from the 3rd Monday because of February vacation week and then on the 4th Monday there was a meeting in town about the school co-op. Anyway. We met. It was a really nice discussion and we all loved the book.
It is in verse, so that is unusual. But it has a delightful rhythm that is subtle and draws the reader in.
It is not a graphic novel, but there is a grey pattern on the pages that depicts (I presume) the accumulating smoke in the elevator as the protagonist progressively sees what was at first an incredibly black and white decision turn into something so grey and foggy that it is almost impossible to know what to do at all. It is subtle, and the layering of it is delightful, and it does not bog me down the way graphic novels and the difficulty of deciphering paneled depictions sometimes can for me.
It is about a difficult topic, that is both very specific (Tupac and Biggie help nail down the approximate time and place, as does the absence of cell phones, the uncle whose “office” was a streetcorner payphone when selling crack initially to get enough money to replace a video camera) and very universal: the problems that confront boys becoming young men, in an environment in which many if not all of the adults participate in extra-legal activities and thus cannot rely upon standard dispute resolution mechanisms (calling the cops, suing in court, etc.) but must instead protect their own territory, their own people, their own honor.
Super, super fantastic book, very clear, which presents a moral conundrum forthrightly, without any preaching. It is a sharp and hard thing to think about with an urgent need for an answer that probably cannot be simple.