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TWERP

Page history last edited by RichiesPicks 10 years, 8 months ago

16 July 2013 TWERP by Mark Goldblatt, Random House, May 28, 288p., ISBN: 978-0-375-97142-6

 

1 "Aquarius/Let the Sunshine In".......................The Fifth Dimension

2 "Sugar, Sugar".................................................The Archies

3 "Honky Tonk Women".....................................The Rolling Stones

4 "Get Back".......................................................The Beatles

5 "Crimson and Clover".....................................Tommy James and the Shondells

6 "Dizzy"..............................................................Tommy Roe

7 "Jean"...............................................................Oliver

8 "Build Me Up, Buttercup"...............................The Foundations

9 "Touch Me"......................................................The Doors

10 "Hair"..............................................................The Cowsills

11 "Sweet Caroline"..........................................Neil Diamond

12 "Crystal Blue Persuasion"...........................Tommy James and the Shondells

13 "Everyday People".......................................Sly and the Family Stone

14 "Good Morning Starshine"..........................Oliver

15 "In the Year 2525"........................................Zager and Evans

16 "I Can't Get Next to You"..............................The Temptations

17 "Love Theme from Romeo and Juliet........Henry Mancini

18 "Proud Mary"................................................Creedence Clearwater Revival

19 "Spinning Wheel".........................................Blood, Sweat and Tears

20 "One"............................................................Three Dog Night

 

These are the first twenty songs on Musicradio 77 WABC's Top 100 of 1969.  Having spent 1969 tuned into that station's d.j.s -- Harry Harrison, Dan Ingram, Cousin Brucie, etc. -- I still know these songs intimately.  I might have listed the first ten, but I can recall in such vivid detail who and where I was during the summer of '69 (the summer for me between junior high and high school) simply by running the tape in my head of (#12) "Crystal Blue Persuasion" and (#91) The Israelites (by Desmond Dekker and the Aces). 

 

Author Mark Goldblatt, two years my junior, grew up a few dozen miles west of me in Queens, NY.  He dedicates this standout coming of age tale and absolutely killer guy read to  the "Thirty-Fourth Avenue Boys" and, in answer to an interview question about his inspiration for TWERP, Mark responded:

 

"I think the seed was planted in the early 1970s, back when I was in high school.  I'd started writing for the school newspaper, and a friend of mine named Ricky was razzing me about it -- it wasn't the kind of thing kids from our block did.  But then, after a couple of minutes, his voice lowered, and he said something that caught me off guard: 'If you ever become a famous writer, you better write a book about us.'  That stuck with me, the tone as much as the content.  There's a sadness about it, an inkling of mortality, or at least a recognition that our lives were about to go in different directions.  That's what happened, of course.  I've lost touch with most of the guys from the block.  But not a day goes by when I don't think about them, where their faces aren't right in front of me, where their voices don't come rushing back."

 

I share this with you because, in Goldblatt's telling, the voices of these young guy characters in TWERP ring so stunningly true and the setting is so utterly vivid.  Particularly, having grown up nearby and having lived those days of '69, I find this to be such a well-told story that hits me right there.

 

TWERP is a powerful read.  At times, it literally had me rolling on the floor and, at others, it had me sobbing.  (I'll never think of Mo Willem's pigeon the same way again.)  Sometimes (as with the painful fence incident involving Eric the Red), there is a lot of rolling on the floor and moaning.  TWERP is written in the first person and it is episodic, reminiscent of some of my favorite Paulsen and Peck in that regard, but is also very different being that the voice here is so authentically Queens Jewish kid.  This is a tale that makes me badly want to get to know this author.

 

TWERP is the nickname that has been given to sixth-grader honor student and speedster Julian Twerski.  Julian finds himself writing the dated entries that form  the chapters of this book -- about himself and the guys on his block -- both as penance for an incident that he was part of, and as a way to avoid having to write a final paper on Shakespeare's Julius Caesar

 

We hear all about Julian's aversion to the Bard: "I hate the guy, William Shakespeare.  If I met him on the street, I'd just keep walking.  Because you know, you just know, while he was writing the stuff he was writing, he was thinking how clever he was.  He was sitting at his desk, writing the words, and he could've just said what he meant, but instead he prettied it up until it could mean everything or it could mean nothing or it could mean whatever the teacher says it means.  That just drives me bananas.  So if keeping this thing going get me out of Julius Caesar, then count me in."

 

While there is a significant bullying issue underlying Julian's story, that issue is really secondary in the reading to these episodic tales he shares about the exploits of himself and the boys from the block.  Above all, they involve Julian's friendship with Lonnie who is the ringleader of the boys, the son of a Holocaust survivor, and is a kid who is currently making his way through sixth grade for the second time.   This is also a book with a real physical side to it, this being about healthy sixth grade boys who are prone to daring exploits.

 

While there are plenty of words that can be employed in characterizing and categorizing TWERP, I'd say that, above all, this is a tween book with a great measure of real heart.

 

Richie Partington, MLIS
Richie's Picks http://richiespicks.com
BudNotBuddy@aol.com
Moderator http://groups.yahoo.com/group/middle_school_lit/

http://slisweb.sjsu.edu/people/faculty/partingtonr/partingtonr.php

 

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