"The Clearing" – Pages 1-61

                “True Love Is Timeless,” is a beautiful way to describe the essence of my current novel, The Clearing by Heather Davis. Filled with romance and twists, this novel is a whole lot of awes, but not your everyday ooey-gooey, lovey-dovey read. Actually, I started reading this novel the day I bought it about four months ago, but got caught up in other books I wanted to start as well, and never got more than twelve pages into it. Once I hit the twenty page mark, I was completely hooked. I apologize for the alteration between novels, but to be true, I misplaced Teen Angst? Naaah… and decided this was a perfect opportunity to pick up The Clearing. Oh, and it was.

                Amy, the main character, has been through a lot the last couple years. She’s seventeen years old and now living with her Aunt Mae on her farm in an incredible small trailer. Amy moved in with Aunt Mae in the beginning of the summer, directly after school was out. She needed to escape the city and all of the attachments, so she moved out of her mother’s house and in with her elderly Aunt Mae for a completely different lifestyle. Amy’s ex-boyfriend, Mark, was controlling and physically abused her for over a year. Because she loved him, she put up with it and never considered leaving. Through all the emotional damage he caused and names he called, she put up with it, and became depressed, trapped inside herself and hating everything she represented.  Eventually, Mark cheated on Amy with her very best friend, and Mark broke up with Amy.  Although this seems like it would be a sigh of relief for her, she was devastated. After all, she loved him. After Mark and Amy’s best friend started dating, Amy finally opened up about the abuse, physical and emotional Mark harmed her with. Sadly, this only caused Amy more problems. None of her friends believed the perfect, athletic, kind, popular Mark could ever do that to a girl, so they deemed her a liar. With all the hurt and suffering she endured, Amy could not go back to her high school in the city. She could not bear to live two minutes down the street from Mark. So, she moved out in the country with her Aunt Mae, as I have discussed.

                This was only the beginning of Davis’ clever creation. During the summer with Aunt Mae, Amy led an incredulously differing lifestyle. Canning vegetables, working in the garden, chopping wood for the winter, driving into town in Aunt Mae’s old pick-up truck –Amy loved it all. That was until she discovered the mist that hung at the edge of Aunt Mae’s property line. At first she had gone into the mist; it was a moist and cool change from the hot summer days on the farm. Eventually the sounds from Aunt Mae’s farm faded, and Aunt Mae’s dog barking was barely hearable. Feeling lost, Amy turned around, trying to find her way back, and made it. September came around and she started school. In a small town, there was a small school. Definitely, it was not the size of school she was used to in the city. Her first few days were horrible, and any trace of welcoming or kindness she brushed away. She called herself “independent” when a boy asked to walk her to her class. Mark had made her uneasy around guys now.

                But then, she met Henry. One day when she was exploring the clearing at the back of Aunt Mae’s, and heard a voice deep through the mist. Slowly, Henry and Amy approached each other and introduced themselves before Amy had to rush off to Aunt Mae for dinner. After a few times of visiting each other behind Aunt Mae’s back, Amy finally breeched Henry’s side of the mist, but fainted in the process. A volt of electricity went through her and she felt dizzy all of the sudden. The air went from damp September to scolding hot July instantly. It was then Amy started to realize there was something peculiar about Henry and his side of the mist. By her clothing, Henry is really wondering as well. He does not understand why such a beautiful girl such as Amy would wear such masculine clothing. (She wears jeans and a fitted Old Navy tank top, but to him women should wear skirts and dress shirts.) Because what the novel hints towards, Henry is from 1944.

                I am indefinitely excited for the rest of this novel to unfold.

During the winter icestorm of 2008.

Everything was encased in a crystal coding after the storm. As the young photographer I was, I used the storm to my advantage and took as many pictures as my memory card could hold. 

 I like to call this photo "Crystal White Dignity," as is posted on my TeenInk.

Considering at 3pm today my school district had already announced a 2-hour Delay for tomorrow,  the blizzard outside is a bit harsh for my taste. I was driving multiple times today, and it was not my cup of tea. Hopefully, there will be a cancelation. That would be lovely.



Pages 1-33 of "Teen Angst? Naaah…"

                Currently on the top of my reading list is a colorful non-fiction novel, Teen Angst? Naaah… by Ned Vizzini. The author calls it his “Quasi-Autobiography.” Having read his top-seller, It’s Kind of a Funny Story, I was interested to find out the depiction of the main character in It’s Kind of a Funny Story was based from himself, Ned Vizzini.  In Teen Angst? Naaah…, Vizzini talks about himself from a first-person point of view, which reads as a collection of essays he has written throughout his preteen to late teenage years.  Throughout the introductions and first several chapters of the novel, Vizzini has been, as expected, indefinitely humorous. 

                Vizzini dives into the novel by first explaining to the readers why and how he started writing this humorous collection of encounters within his young life. It all began with his backpack.  Ned Vizzini lived in New York City; as students did not attend schools which were closest to the student, Ned, along with many other students, went to a school specialized for Math and Science in middle school. His school was so, rather large, there were several escalators within its grounds. He set his backpack against his legs while riding down the escalator, causing it to tumble down the flight and into the hind legs of a girl (imaginarily talking on her imaginary cell phone), who decided to make Ned’s life miserable by yelling at him. During the subway ride home, Ned pulled out a scrap piece of paper and scribbled rants about this girl. This is what the introduction of his first non-fiction novel became.

                When the Nintendo came out, Ned explains (throughout about fifteen pages) how the Nintendo truly did save his childhood. As a compulsive worker, Ned dedicated himself to one single thing during his childhood and would be satisfied with occupying himself with that single thing for months at a time. Whether it was Nintendo or the Specialized Science High School Admissions Test (SSHSAT), Ned was constantly involved in one specific thing at a time. Later in my reading, the SSHSAT bluntly showed Ned’s problem. Spending hours every day studying, making note cards and using them all throughout the day, asking his parents to buy him every text book which could help him, Ned Vizzini had a problem with over-commitment.  He never saw the line between hard working and working yourself too hard.

                Although the encounters Ned goes through are relatively humorous, the melancholy outlook is a twist. Even though I am laughing with Ned for all the bad things that had gone wrong in his life, I feel sorry for him on a level I do not think he does. It is a stretch, but I think the author sees his life as humorous and simply cannot see the utter unfairness I can.