Speak, by Laurie Halse Anderson

Okay, let's start this off with the last book I've read this summer: Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson.

My edition: Anderson, Laurie Halse. Speak. Platinum Ed. New York: Penguin Group, 2006. Print.

Pages: 198

The title of this novel is a nice irony that is developed as the reader gets to know the teenaged protagonist, Melinda. Why? Because she doesn't talk. I'm pretty sure that with my fingers alone I'd be able to count every time Melinda speaks to another character. But noticing the lack of verbal input isn't as easy as one would think. Because the book is narrated in first person, we, the readers, take on the role of confidants to the main character. As one would expect of a girl thrown into her first year of high school, everything Melinda says is full of emotion, she transmits a strong sensation of soaring feelings under both, her averageness and attempts to be "just another girl."

But the plot is much more promising than just a girl starting high school with her emotions fluttering á la butterflies having seizures in midair. There's a reason Melinda doesn't speak. Mind you, she is not mute but scared, rather. Something happened to her just as she was finishing 8th grade and middle school, in a party. Confronted by the event, she did something in response.

This earned Melinda a social scar deep as (and symmetrical to) a psychological trauma. Embarrassed and scared, she tells what happened to her to no one. She loses all of her friends and their clique dissolves into others. Her best friend hates her. She becomes an outcast with rumors following her as fleas would a filthy dog. Her parents quarrel with her nonstop and her teachers cannot understand her, nor do they try to (save for one honorable character). [And most of this is revealed by page 12.]

All in all, the plot is nicely accomplished. Since it's written from a teenager's point of view, the reader is constantly being faced with the pressures of everyday life (heightened by the fact that Melinda suffered/suffers from a severe crisis); say, the pressure of social status and reputation, the ferociousness of carnivorous teachers, detachment from parents and the longing for friendship. Because of all these, the plot seems to advance at a slow pace, but each small event leads to others further along, seemingly worthless parts of the book do their part in advancing the plot, however little.

This brings me to my next point: structure. I'm not particularly crazy about this one. The book is divided into four sections (called Marking Periods) that represent the... well, marking periods in Melinda's freshman year. Each of these sections is further divided by small events (the shortest being a paragraph long, the largest three pages) that happened in that time lapse, each with its own title. This isn't a crime against organization, or anything, but took me a while to set my bias aside. I see this "minuscule chapter-like events following one after another endlessly" setup a little hard to take seriously. Especially when the novel touches the kind of subject it does.

Then there's the problem with dialog. Anderson introduces verbal communication as one would in a play:

"Mother: 'That's the point, she won't say anything! I can't get a word out of her. She's mute.'"

Do not get me started on how ... naïve this looks, and the quotation marks after the colon? Not cool. But, I suppose there IS a rational explanation for this. To mark Melinda's muteness, the author does the following:

"Me: [blank] "

So it basically might've been to get better visuals on her speaklessness. I suppose I'll let this slide.

The mood and tone of the book is rather well accomplished. Melinda's little psychological issue makes her view the world as dark, where there's no one to trust, nothing to say, etc. Yet, it manages to become a teen novel because of the way the author throws in small pieces of humor, just out of time with the past qualities to not make this some sort of dark-humor novel. I think it's the sarcasm that saves Speak from being dull at times.

Extras

For the Twilight movie fans/haters I have good/bad news for you. Speak had its own movie done (which, though with a promising plot, I don't plan on watching). Melinda is played by none other than Kristen Stewart [cue claps/groans]. It seems to me as a role she could play quite well, the author herself praised Stewart's performance. So there's that.

Memorable quotes

So I'll be honest with you, I was actually trying to fly through this book because its a busy summer, reading-wise. Therefore, only two pieces of texts caught my attention. This may be either good or bad.

#1: "It is easier to floss with barbed wire than admit you like someone in middle school." [Note aforementioned sarcasm.]

#2: "Me: 'I don't feel well.'

"Mom pats my back.

"Mom: 'You must be sick. You're talking.'

"Even she can hear how this bitchy that sounds." [I'll admit this one just made me chuckle.]

Best character

The best character in the novel is, in my opinion, Ivy, who beats the other two competitors by not too much. Ivy used to be one of Melinda's friends before their clique dissipated. She is then described as "Ivy floats between the Suffering Artists on one side of the aisle and the Thespians on the other. She has enough personality to travel with two packs." That's awesome in my rulebook.

While Rachel is the only of Melinda's ex-friends who straight up hates her, Nicole is friendly, but aloof. On the other hand, Ivy is consistently friendly and nice and actually looks for her in a scene. While they never do actually hang out, Ivy's appraisal of Melinda's work in art helps her find her voice, artistic, physical and argumentative.

She has a mad fear of clowns, which is too bad since her art projects have to be based around that idea. Being the artsy girl she is, Ivy tried to put her feelings into her artistic depictions. There's not much to say about her, seeing as how she's never consistently mentioned.

Runner ups:

Mr. Freeman: The slightly loony art professor. He's the only one to support Melinda and shows his admiration for her pieces. He, like Ivy, helps Melinda speak.

David Petrakis: The super genius freshman who takes one of the teachers to court and wins. He also may or may not like the protagonist.

Overall rating of the book: 7/10

The plot is good enough to earn it 4 out of 5 plot points, though I was a little bit unhappy with the ending. Furthermore, I couldn't get past the structure. Call me orthodox or uptight, but it really bothered me. The other 3 out of 5 points are given out according to my subjectivity (because literature is art, and one can't look at art without his own emotions).

I'd recommend it, though to a select kind of readers.

If I lost it, I wouldn't buy it again.

If I needed a fire to keep me warm and had no fuel, this book certainly wouldn't be said fuel.