Handbook for Boys
A Novel
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- 27,99 lei
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- 27,99 lei
Publisher Description
In the groundbreaking tradition of his award-winning Monster and Bad Boy: A Memoir, Walter Dean Myers fashions a highly readable, powerful novel about the rules for success for young men, especially those navigating coming of age while Black.
Share this book in the classroom, in a father-son reading group, or as a summer reading (or anytime) choice that's likely to spark conversation and be a favorite.
"When the proprietor of a Harlem barbershop takes over as the court-appointed mentor for two troubled teenagers, he conveys the message that the future is built not only on hard work but on sustaining dreams as well." (Smithsonian magazine).
In his introduction to Handbook for Boys, Walter Dean Myers wrote: "I know as a troubled teenager I would have loved to have a neighborhood barbershop to sit in and a group of worldly and knowledgeable men to counsel me. Thinking about this was my motivation in writing this book, hoping it will be, in the least, a jumping-off point for many interesting conversations about success."
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
Returning to the setting for his 145th Street: Short Stories, Myers (Monster) constructs a penetrating profile of a community through the brief appearances of characters who file through Duke Wilson's barbershop. The author juxtaposes a sketch of 16-year-old narrator Jimmy Lynch's home life with nuggets of wisdom delivered by the barber with wit and tact. As the novel opens, Jimmy is about to be assigned to a youth facility for six months, until Duke offers to take him into his "community mentoring program." Initially Jimmy and Kevin, another teen whom Duke mentors, call the shop the "Torture Chamber." But as Jimmy shows up to the shop day after day at 3:30 p.m. to sweep, hang old photographs on the wall and polish spitoons, his anger and resistance erode and he begins to absorb Duke's advice. Organized into chapters with titles as straightforward as "Victims" (featuring a man who is evicted and whose marriage is in trouble because he "just go from day to day to see what event stumble into," in Duke's words) and as humorous as "The Blind Monkey Strut" and "Froggy Goes A Courting," the novel introduces various customers from ex-cons to a millionaire who demonstrate specific life lessons. Jimmy's change in attitude is gradual and credible, and his tenuous friendship with Kevin takes an unexpectedly poignant turn when Kevin falls back into trouble. The author's instructional prefatory note may be offputting, but once inside the book, readers will be hooked. Ages 10-up.
