Purple Daze
A Far Out Trip, 1965
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- $8.99
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- $8.99
Publisher Description
Love, friendship, rock 'n' roll, and war. As senior year comes to a close, Ziggy, Mickey, Cheryl, Nancy, Don, and Phil are on the razor's edge of change in the City of Angels. With the Vietnam War and civil rights movement in the air, the future seems as full of uncertainty as it does excitement. Through journal entries, notes, letters, and interconnected poems, the year 1965 in six high school friends' lives is followed with humor, pain, drama, and truth. An interview with author Sherry Shahan, along with photos and a playlist, provide insight into the creation of this powerful and unforgettable novel.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Shahan's (Death Mountain) novel in verse is packed with the experiences and emotions of six suburban Los Angeles high school students during the tumultuous year of 1965, set against the backdrop of the Vietnam War draft, political assassinations, racism, the advent of LSD and Napalm, and rock 'n' roll. More than anything it's a story of innocence lost: Nancy unhappily works in a diner after her boyfriend Phil is drafted; Cheryl is attacked by her "sex pervert" neighbor, and her relationship with Don is on the rocks; and Ziggy runs wild with sex and drugs after her boyfriend, Mickey, joins the Navy ("Think I'll drop out and enlist./ It'd be a blast to blow stuff up"). Telling her story largely through the characters' journal entries, notes, and letters, Shahan also offers interludes about period events, speeches, and culture, further contextualizing the setting and helping illuminate each teen's circumstances and their shared feelings of abandonment, resentment, and betrayal. Shahan's writing pulls no punches as she offers a poignant mosaic that functions on personal and universal levels. Ages 14 up.
