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[CCBC-Net] "Feed" and "The House of the Scorpion"
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From: Olgy Gary <olgy>
Date: Fri, 17 Jan 2003 12:16:43 -0700
Original Message ----From: "Kathleen Horning"
nominees, "Feed" and "The House of the Scorpion," but I'm wondering if anyone who has read both books would care to compare and contrast them?
WARNING: Skip this e-mail if you plan to read either one of these titles-this is a
"spoiler" commentary.
Kathleen, I read them both. Loved one (House of the Scorpion), didn't like the other
(Feed).
I found FEED to be a painful read. The dialogue didn't necessarily flow but rather it's as if the author went to shopping malls and copied down every teenage soundbite he heard and force?d them all into this one book. I finished reading the book only because I'd started it and wanted to see what all the buzz was about. FEED didn't read anything like THE HOUSE OF THE SCORPION did. In Farmer's book words flowed, dialogue flowed, story flowed. I did not get a headache reading Farmer's title. The young protagonist was real and the dialogue felt real. FEED gave me a headache. Maybe that was the point. The chatter never stopped and maybe that's what the author was trying to portray might happen to us as a culture in the near future. BUT I still wanted to see and get to know the characters behind the noise. It didn't happen in FEED. That's what I loved about THE HOUSE OF THE SCORPION which is a futuristic write as well. Farmer presented a probable future to us but did not do away with the humanity of the people, of her characters in doing so.
One more thing about the teenage dialogue in FEED...was it just me or did others think it was forced? I didn't feel I was listening to teenagers from the future talking. I love reading sci-fi/fantasy and can feel transported to that future world when the dialogue is properly used (think "Dune," think
"Chroniches of Amber," think even "Crazy Time"). I didn't feel that way reading FEED. I felt as if these were boys doing "valley-girl" talk...at high speed...high on something.
I like seeing, as much as possible, a strategy of hope built into the reads we bring our children. FEED gives us a catastrophic vision, an apocalyptic vision of the future, an imploding world...FEED is "selling" us fear, hopelessness...HOUSE OF THE SCORPION would be selling hope...hope to go beyond technology into using technology for the greater good.
FEED also gets heavy handed in the preaching department. On page 40 we read,
"Of course, everyone is like, da da da, evil corporations, oh they're so bad, we all say that, and we all know they control everything. I mean, it's not great, because who knows what evil shit they're up to. Everyone feels bad about that. But they're the only way to get all this stuff, and it's no good getting pissy about it, because they're still going to control everything whether you like it or not." On and on it goes basically painting capitalism and american corporations the same way that many folks feel today about them. Nothing new here.
The one redeeming part of FEED was the secondary character, Violet. She came close to embodying hope but was killed actively the society and passively by Titus (our main character). On pg 117 we see her wanting to slow down time by relishing the little moments, the seconds within daily living rather than hyperlinking from one main big event to the next. She also begins resisting the feed culture and stretch it to its breaking point by interacting with it in an atypical way. But rather than being rewarded, as a hero should, for her efforts, she pays the price for noncomformity when later on the system does not want to pay for repairs in her feed because her interactions with it have labeled her as atypical.
To be fair there are itty bitty signs that Titus' soul, his humanity, might just might be there and ready to make an appereance. At one point he describes chasing "coolness" as an empty persuit. "It was like I kept buying these things to be cool, but cool was alwyas flying jsut ahead of me, and I could never exactly catch up to it. I felt like I'd been running towards it for a long time." Also at the very end he's sorry for who he is and what he's done to Violet. The book ends with him crying at her deathbed. But it's too little too late...both for Titus, Violet and the reader.
These are my thoughts when I compare these two titles in my mind. After reading both I'm still sooo rooting for HOUSE OF THE SCORPION to win the Newbery.
Olgy
________________________________________________ Olgy Gary, M.A., CCF's General Manager Children Come First...because they're our greatest treasure! http://www.childrencomefirst.com
Received on Fri 17 Jan 2003 01:16:43 PM CST
Date: Fri, 17 Jan 2003 12:16:43 -0700
Original Message ----From: "Kathleen Horning"
nominees, "Feed" and "The House of the Scorpion," but I'm wondering if anyone who has read both books would care to compare and contrast them?
WARNING: Skip this e-mail if you plan to read either one of these titles-this is a
"spoiler" commentary.
Kathleen, I read them both. Loved one (House of the Scorpion), didn't like the other
(Feed).
I found FEED to be a painful read. The dialogue didn't necessarily flow but rather it's as if the author went to shopping malls and copied down every teenage soundbite he heard and force?d them all into this one book. I finished reading the book only because I'd started it and wanted to see what all the buzz was about. FEED didn't read anything like THE HOUSE OF THE SCORPION did. In Farmer's book words flowed, dialogue flowed, story flowed. I did not get a headache reading Farmer's title. The young protagonist was real and the dialogue felt real. FEED gave me a headache. Maybe that was the point. The chatter never stopped and maybe that's what the author was trying to portray might happen to us as a culture in the near future. BUT I still wanted to see and get to know the characters behind the noise. It didn't happen in FEED. That's what I loved about THE HOUSE OF THE SCORPION which is a futuristic write as well. Farmer presented a probable future to us but did not do away with the humanity of the people, of her characters in doing so.
One more thing about the teenage dialogue in FEED...was it just me or did others think it was forced? I didn't feel I was listening to teenagers from the future talking. I love reading sci-fi/fantasy and can feel transported to that future world when the dialogue is properly used (think "Dune," think
"Chroniches of Amber," think even "Crazy Time"). I didn't feel that way reading FEED. I felt as if these were boys doing "valley-girl" talk...at high speed...high on something.
I like seeing, as much as possible, a strategy of hope built into the reads we bring our children. FEED gives us a catastrophic vision, an apocalyptic vision of the future, an imploding world...FEED is "selling" us fear, hopelessness...HOUSE OF THE SCORPION would be selling hope...hope to go beyond technology into using technology for the greater good.
FEED also gets heavy handed in the preaching department. On page 40 we read,
"Of course, everyone is like, da da da, evil corporations, oh they're so bad, we all say that, and we all know they control everything. I mean, it's not great, because who knows what evil shit they're up to. Everyone feels bad about that. But they're the only way to get all this stuff, and it's no good getting pissy about it, because they're still going to control everything whether you like it or not." On and on it goes basically painting capitalism and american corporations the same way that many folks feel today about them. Nothing new here.
The one redeeming part of FEED was the secondary character, Violet. She came close to embodying hope but was killed actively the society and passively by Titus (our main character). On pg 117 we see her wanting to slow down time by relishing the little moments, the seconds within daily living rather than hyperlinking from one main big event to the next. She also begins resisting the feed culture and stretch it to its breaking point by interacting with it in an atypical way. But rather than being rewarded, as a hero should, for her efforts, she pays the price for noncomformity when later on the system does not want to pay for repairs in her feed because her interactions with it have labeled her as atypical.
To be fair there are itty bitty signs that Titus' soul, his humanity, might just might be there and ready to make an appereance. At one point he describes chasing "coolness" as an empty persuit. "It was like I kept buying these things to be cool, but cool was alwyas flying jsut ahead of me, and I could never exactly catch up to it. I felt like I'd been running towards it for a long time." Also at the very end he's sorry for who he is and what he's done to Violet. The book ends with him crying at her deathbed. But it's too little too late...both for Titus, Violet and the reader.
These are my thoughts when I compare these two titles in my mind. After reading both I'm still sooo rooting for HOUSE OF THE SCORPION to win the Newbery.
Olgy
________________________________________________ Olgy Gary, M.A., CCF's General Manager Children Come First...because they're our greatest treasure! http://www.childrencomefirst.com
Received on Fri 17 Jan 2003 01:16:43 PM CST
