Monster: Novel-Ties Study Guides - Softcover

9780767512527: Monster: Novel-Ties Study Guides

Softcover

ISBN 10: 0767512529 ISBN 13: 9780767512527

BONUS FEATURE: Afterword read by the author

A Harlem drugstore owner was shot and killed in his store, and the word is that 16-year-old Steve Harmon served as the lookout. Was he involved or was he simply in the wrong place at the wrong time? An amateur filmmaker, Steve transcribes his trial into a movie script, showing scene by scene how his life was turned around in an instant.

FADE IN: INTERIOR: Early morning in CELL BLOCK D, MANHATTAN DETENTION CENTER.

Steve (Voice-Over): Sometimes I feel like I have walked into the middle of a movie. Maybe I can make my own movie. The film will be the story of my life. No, not my life, but of this experience. I'll call it what the lady prosecutor called me...Monster.

FADE IN: INTERIOR COURT. A guard sits at a desk behind STEVE. KATHY O’BRIEN, STEVE’s lawyer, is all business as she talks to STEVE.

O’BRIEN
Let me make sure you understand what’s going on. Both you and this King character are on trial for felony murder. Felony murder is as serious as it gets....When you’re in court, you sit there and pay attention. You let the jury know that you think the case is as serious as they do....

STEVE
You think we’re going to win?

O’BRIEN (seriously)
It probably depends on what you mean by “win.”
“The production is recorded as a full-cast dramatization, and it's difficult to imagine how it might have been accomplished more effectively. A superb recording of an intriguing work.”—AudioFile Earphones Award Winner

Coretta Scott King: Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement
Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Literature for Young Adults
National Book Award finalist
Coretta Scott King Author Honor Book
Edgar Allan Poe Award nominee, Best Young Adult
Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Book

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Review:

"Monster" is what the prosecutor called 16-year-old Steve Harmon for his supposed role in the fatal shooting of a convenience store owner. But was Steve really the lookout who gave the "all-clear" to the murderer, or was he just in the wrong place at the wrong time? In this innovative novel by Walter Dean Myers, the reader becomes both juror and witness during the trial of Steve's life. To calm his nerves as he sits in the courtroom, aspiring filmmaker Steve chronicles the proceedings in movie script form. Interspersed throughout his screenplay are journal writings that give insight to Steve's life before the murder and his feelings about being held in prison during the trial. "They take away your shoelaces and your belt so you can't kill yourself no matter how bad it is. I guess making you live is part of the punishment."

Myers, known for the inner-city classic Motown and Didi, proves with Monster that he has kept up with both the struggles and the lingo of today's teens. Steve is an adolescent caught up in the violent circumstances of an adult world--a situation most teens can relate to on some level. Even reluctant readers will no doubt be attracted to the novel's handwriting-styled type-face, emphasis on dialogue, and fast-paced courtroom action. By weaving together Steve's journal entries and his script, Myers has given the first person voice a new twist and added yet another worthy volume to his already admirable body of work. (Ages 12 and older) --Jennifer Hubert, Amazon.com

Review:

"Myers grapples with complex moral questions that will definitely make readers stop and think."-- Booklist," Editors' Choice 1999The main character is a teenage boy accused of having participated in a crime that ended in murder, but the intriguing moral questions at the root of this award-winning book cross age boundaries."-- Booklist" April 1, 2000

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