“I know you all work hard, but I am doubtful as to whether
you think hard.” Truth.
51.12 The Year of the Gadfly
This book caught my attention via Twitter. The author set up a “Novelade” stand in
New York to self promote. Buy the
book and get free cookies – Brilliant!
I knew that if I walked by her I would buy the book, so instead of just
thinking on it I went to my local store and picked it up.
Basically, this is a boarding school mystery, complete with
secret societies, hidden pasts, and creepy basements long forgotten. I think that A Secret History is still
the best of the genre, and while I always go into these books thinking I will
love them it seems that the older I get the less I like to revisit my own adolescent
self as I read. It is impossible
for me not to compare my own experience, and with Gadfly I did it both as a
teenager and as a teacher. I loved
seeing the passion Jonah had to make his students really think, and think for
themselves, but all along he had to pretend that the part of him who had been
so easily swayed as a teenager never existed. I liked the shifts between POV
and time even though at times it became a bit confusing because the voices were
not all that different. The
weaving of all the characters stories into one was done well but I never I
bought that Iris was 14. The ending was a bit too much. I do think there is truth in needing to
get away from where you grow up to discover who you are or escape some of who
you were, but I do not think that staying behind leaves you damaged.
What I liked best was the theme of heroes and whom we chose
to look up to, be it teachers, siblings, or celebrities, it is never
ourselves. And because we see them
as heroes we tend to focus on the aspects we want and ignore the other parts,
just like we highlight what we think others like in ourselves while hiding some
truths. We pretend these people
are perfect even though we know they can’t be, but why do we do that? Does it make us work harder or try to
be better, or does it just end up making us feel worse?
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