I Am the Cheese - Hardcover

Cormier, Robert

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0394834623 ISBN 13: 9780394834627

Publisher: Random House Childrens Books, 1994

Synopsis

1. Adam is pedaling on the bike at the beginning and the end of the novel. What do you think this endless cycling refers to? Does the book have a sense of motion? Is there a destination? 2. Discuss the meaning of the title. Is it significant that it comes from a nursery song sung by Adam at the end of the book? 3. Adam is struggling to understand his identity. What composes his identity? What composes your identity? What defines you? 4. Do you think this novel is a tragedy? What types of injustice are done to Adam? How does the government view him? Does it value him? In what way(s)? 5. Adam is being manipulated by the doctors/ government. How is Cormier manipulating you as the reader and why?

About this title

Review:

Robert Cormier's dark, psychological thriller, I Am The Cheese, is one of the most chilling and disturbing books of its kind. As Adam Farmer begins to reveal his darkest fears to a faceless and nameless psychiatrist, he is forced to look deep into his memory to discover why he made such a treacherous journey to get to this point. As the events and suspicions that led Adam to the physchiatrist's chair begin to form more clearly in his mind, he is obliged to face the undeniable truth about the fearful secrets and nightmares that his mind has chosen to erase.

Cormier is in dangerously fine form in this excellent book. His uncompromising and sometimes traumatic prose makes for a thriller that is at once terrifying and compulsive as it races towards its shocking climax, leaving as many questions unanswered at the end of the book as at the beginning. --Susan Harrison

Review:

" A horrifying tale . . . the buildup of suspense is terrific." "- School Library Journal, "Starred
" AN ABSORBING, EVEN brilliant job. The book is assembled in mosaic fashion: a tiny chip here, a chip there. . . . Everything is related to something else; everything builds and builds to a fearsome climax. . . . Cormier . . . has the knack of making horror out of the ordinary, as the masters of suspense know how to do." - "The New York Times Book Review"

"A horrifying tale . . . the buildup of suspense is terrific." - School Library Journal, Starred"AN ABSORBING, EVEN brilliant job. The book is assembled in mosaic fashion: a tiny chip here, a chip there. . . . Everything is related to something else; everything builds and builds to a fearsome climax. . . . Cormier . . . has the knack of making horror out of the ordinary, as the masters of suspense know how to do." - The New York Times Book Review

About this edition

• Publisher: Random House Childrens Books
• Publication date: 1994
• ISBN 10: 0394834623
• ISBN 13: 9780394834627
• Binding: Hardcover