Falling Boy
I'm Kim Alexander and this is Fiction Nation. The book is Falling Boy by Alison McGhee. I've spoken before about the mythology of children. Adults seem to forget what kids are like, and reinvent them as either sitcom wisecrackers — always ready with a punchline and always the smartest one in the house — or we recast them as Ralph Lauren models, perfectly dressed and impeccably mannered. I actually had a girlfriend whose son was just like this. He could pour a perfect martini at age 9. I loved that kid. Anyway, most kids are certainly not that coiffed. And of course there are the dark hinterlands of the baby hooker Bratz™ dolls. So they're comedians, supermodels, exotic dancers, props to bring mommy and daddy back together, plot devices, innocent mouthpieces dropped from heaven to impart the honest truth of the world to the jaded, lost adults around them, or silent, sleeping angels.
Clearly, it's hard to write words for children and make them sound authentic. We just don't recall how we ourselves sounded, and of course kids speak very differently to adults than to each other. If you could turn yourself invisible and spend some time in the lunchroom or the playground, you'd probably see a secret world of vicious infighting, rivalry, war, triumph and tragedy on a scale that would make a superhero think twice. It's a small world, but it's the only one they've got.
Apparently, Alison Mcghee has learned how to turn herself invisible, because her novel Falling Boy featured the most honest sounding dialogue right out of the mouth of babes. Joseph is 16, stuck in a wheelchair, stuck with his newly custodial father, stuck working in a bakery in Minneapolis, far from his old home in New York. Enzo is a 9 year old force of nature, and it was Enzo that really captured me. She is blazingly honest, angry, sad, and prefers to be called The Mighty Thor, because being a 9 year old girl falls far short of being a superhero.
So this is a book that reads like you're a fly on the wall, and the slowly unraveling mystery of how Joseph came to be in a wheelchair, what happened to his mother, why Enzo wants him to be a superhero so desperately, all become as important and as earth shaking as anything that ever happened in the adult world.
Alison Mcghee is writer of bestselling books for young adults, children, and the rest of us.
The book is Falling Boy by Alison McGhee. I'm Kim Alexander and this is Fiction Nation on Take Five, XM 155.
Hear my interview with Alison McGhee on Fiction Nation, on Take Five, XM 155 on Saturday July 7th at 6pm and Sunday July 8th at 10:00am, and on Sonic Theater, XM 163 on Sunday July 8th at 11:30am and pm. All times EDT.
I'm Kim Alexander and this is a Fiction Nation minute. The book is Falling Boy by Alison McGhee.
It's a rare writer who can climb into the character of a child and not make the kid unbearably precocious or too cute. Alison Mcghee has created an unforgettable 9 year old girl in this novel; her name is Enzo although she prefers to go by The Mighty Thor. She's not quite the main character, that would be 16 year old Joseph, recently confined to a wheelchair and silently coming to terms with his new life, but it's Enzo that grabbed me. Falling Boy works as a slowly unfolding mystery — how did Joseph wind up in that chair? But learning so much about these characters, listening to them talk, that's the pleasure of this book. Alison McGhee is my guest this weekend, she'll talk about Falling Boy and how Joseph and Enzo came to be. That's Saturday at 6pm east and Sunday at 10am east on Fiction Nation on Take Five, XM 155.
I'm Kim Alexander and this is a Fiction Nation minute. The book is Falling Boy by Alison McGhee.
On the one hand, this is a book about a boy in a wheelchair and his friends working in a bakery one long Minneapolis summer. On the other, this is a mystery. How did Joseph wind up in that chair? Is he a superhero from the Island of Bees? What ever happened to Joseph's mother? Why won't anyone tell 9 year old Enzo the truth? Or call her The Mighty Thor, which she clearly prefers. Falling Boy is set in a world without parents, where the children must look after each other, or not, and where triumphs and tragedies are as grand as anything that ever happened to Superman. Alison McGhee is my guest this weekend to talk about Falling Boy, and how she created such strange, honest, wonderful characters. Fiction Nation is on Saturday at 6pm east and Sunday at 10am east on on Take Five, XM 155.
I'm Kim Alexander and this is a Fiction Nation minute. The book is Falling Boy by Alison McGhee.
Children are a little strange. They ask uncomfortable questions, they have secret identities, they never tell adults what's really going on, and they can be really mean to each other. Falling Boy is a gorgeously written peek at the secret lives of children, a bunch of mismatched kids spending the summer working in a bakery in Minneapolis. All 9 year old Enzo wants to know is what happened to 16 year old Joseph — he's in a wheelchair and he won't tell her anything. Is he a superhero? She thinks so, in fact, she creates a whole mythology — Joseph is a superhero cast out from the Island of the Bees — in place of the one he refuses to supply for himself. In Falling Boy, the kids talk like you'd imagine they do in their own private places, and when the truth finally comes out, its both ordinanry and shattering. Falling Boy by Alison McGhee. This is Fiction Nation on Take Five, XM 155.
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