Blog - Important Issues and Young Adult Literature

Important issues:
Aggression: Most of people in this book have some problems with anger. Like everyone in the Nak Pack, Bo’s dad, Hudgie’s dad, Elvis’s dad, and some other people… They’re not angry all the time, they just have scary outbursts. Is that how real angry people are? I wonder if that’s online. I should probably pick one of these to research. Moving on.
Child abuse: Hudgie, Shelly’s sister and cousin, anyone else? Elvis was too right? Right. Ok, so I feel bad for them of course and I can understand why half of them need to be in anger management. How could Shelly’s relatives just lie and say that their uncle never did anything? That’s really messed up. =(
Racism: Shu. I think he needs to forget about the racist people that he beats up all the time. I mean just let them be all stupid and not beat them up. Then he’d be fine. Good plan right? Of course.
Drinking: Mr. N. I’m sure he was messed up after the accident. I like can’t even imagine that happening to me. That’s the thing that scares me the most about driving. I’m so scared of stoplights. I always think I’m not going to stop or something and kill someone. =O Maybe I’ll just ride the bus until I like can’t go anywhere.
Suicide: Hudige’s mom. This isn’t very important but you know, it happened. And it’s bad.
Gambling: Shelly’s bet with Wyrack. Also, not important. I don’t think this is the bad, addictive kind that’s actually an important problem but you know, it works.
I still don’t know which one I’m going to research. =/
Young Adult Literature (YAL):
“Definition: The genre is usually described as works that involve ideas and transitions that young adults are concerned about, are involved in, or can relate to. Many young adult books have a young adult as the main character as well.” – Mrs. Theis
Ironman is a good example of YAL because it’s about things that teens would understand. Most young adults get mad at their parents sometimes. Their parents probably aren’t usually as bad as the ones in the novel but some people complain like they are. I think a lot of teens would want to read Ironman because it’s easy to understand and the topics are interesting enough to get people to keep going, at least to find out what happens, if they don’t care about the important issues.
Other YAL books by Crutcher:
STOTAN!
King of the Mild Frontier
The Sledding Hill