By Chris Crutcher
It's fun to read short stories sometimes. Especially good ones. You don't have to read them in order, you don't even have to finish the book (though you'll want to with this one), and it's just not as big of a commitment as picking up a novel. Almost all of the stories in this book feature characters from other novels by Chris Crutcher--so if you're familiar with his books, you'll probably recognize some names. But you don't need to read the other books to enjoy this one.
The teenage boys in these six short stories are all dealing with different issues; one boy lost his parents and little brother in a drunk boating accident, another puts up with teasing about his gay parents, yet another is afraid of humiliation when he has to wrestle a girl during a tournament. There are loving fathers and abusive fathers and absent fathers and racist fathers within these beautifully written stories. What all the teenagers have in common is a love of sports--wrestling and swimming, especially. For them, being athletes is the way they release anger, sadness, joy, and playing sports allows them to feel like part of a team.
Chris Crutcher tackles real-life problems. I kept thinking about the characters even after I finished reading--because they seemed real. I wondered how they were going to overcome certain things, and felt sort of proud of the way they got through hard situations. Mostly I admire how the author is not afraid to write about serious, hard-to-hear-about subjects like racism (one story is told from the point of view of a white boy who has always been racist, but starts to question his own perspective). For those readers who enjoy(ed) Matt Christopher's books but want something more challenging and complex, try reading Chris Crutcher.
(ISBN: 978-0-06-050-783-1)
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