We have reached the day – it’s time to discuss The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian by Sherman Alexie. There have been many positive, and introspective reviews of the book both since our announcement of its choice for this book club, and over the years of Cannonball Read’s existence. So, let’s dig in and talk about the why’s and how’s with this book, and some larger thematic conversations as well.
Let’s start with a few ground rules:
- Since we’re anticipating lots of conversation, please try your best to reply directly to each other, that way they are alerted and can keep discussing!
- Discussing is the important word. Let’s have a conversation so try to keep the thoughts flowing and give your fellow readers something to respond to.
- Please reference the topic number you are responding to (if you are) so other Book Clubbers can hunt up the topics they want to discuss with you.
- Not that I’m expecting to need to, but be warned that I retain the right to delete any comments which go beyond the normal civil banter we have here at Cannonball Read. Consider yourselves warned J
There are also some additional topics that we’ll be putting up over at our Facebook Group, Cannonball Read Book Chat, throughout the course of the afternoon if you feel like chatting there as well. The guidelines above are in effect there as well.
Here are our topics to begin our conversation:
- Visuals appear frequently in this work, from its cover design to the art by Ellen Forney. What is their impact on your understanding of the dichotomy of Junior?
- Addiction and poverty. They are likely expected themes in a book about modern life on a reservation. How do you think they were handled, how did they affect you while reading?
- This book is a Banned Book list perennial entry and a National Book Award Winner. Do you think the same aspects of the book cause it to be on both lists?
- The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian is designated as YA. What is your definition of YA, and how does this novel fit into it?
- Language – Junior speaks the way 14-year-old boys speak. How do you think this impacts the reader’s appreciation of the character? Does it matter what age the reader is?
- Cultural markers – we all learn our cultures through experience. Like Junior, we know the rules. What “rules” in your own experience have been challenged, like Junior’s?
I don’t even know where to start talking about this book. I loved it so much.
I guess I’ll mention the artwork. It really got me with that first drawing of Rowdy, where Junior draws this beautiful figure study of his friend, and then overlays it with that ridiculous cartoon angry face. Just like Junior, smart and serious and talented, and goofy and vulnerable and weird.
The artwork added so much, I agree. I loved that the styles did vary from cartoon to sketch. The art in this post, and throughout the book, reminded me of the Richard Scarry picture books where everything was labeled.
Did you read the interview at the end with Ellen Forney? It was really interesting to hear her talk about the three main styles she had Junior use (lifelike, cartoon, and in between, the example on this post being one of the latter).
I DID NOT! Off to read that right now!
I love your comparison to Richard Scarry!
I loved the artwork used here. There is so much emotion that can be conveyed in a picture that words simply can’t convey, which I found 1000% appropriate for a teenage boy.
I loved that sometimes it was used for levity, but sometimes for the most horrible situations. The one that stuck with me was about how his dad’s best friend got shot for drinking wine. Ugh.
Point 2. – I think the book addresses the poverty and addiction really well. Both issues are more background issues which influence the lives of the characters but never the only thing that troubles Junior. It’s both really sad, that he just accepts the poverty and alcoholism as part of life, and really hopeful in that he can at least get out.
I really liked the way the rage at the injustice of his life just blew out of him unexpectedly on that first day of school. The fact that it was so weird to him that he really didn’t know where it came from was really descriptive and spot on. You get so used to something that you don’t really think about how angry it makes you until you just can’t take anymore and then break your teacher’s nose.
I think the saddest part of the book was when he’s trying to convince Rowdy to come along with him, and Rowdy refuses. Rowdy’s later justification for the refusal, that Indians have stopped being a nomadic people just really compounds that.
The resignation also rang true to me. My circumstances are much different, but the responses each character had made so much sense to me.
Oh, Rowdy. I loved him so.
I think I am the only person so far who had a less than glowing review, and it was because of #5 Language.
I don’t take very well to the inner monologue of a character having the exact same cadence and affect as their speech. So I don’t mind when Junior and Rowdy have a dialogue and speak like 14 year old boys, but to constantly read the narration in that style grates on me. I think because the shape of our conscious thoughts is so nebulous compared to the words that come out, I don’t mind when a character’s mental narration isn’t consistent with their speech patterns. In fact I prefer it.
None of this is to say that Alexie made a bad choice here, because clearly a lot of people really gel with it. I just don’t. But I found it more difficult to concentrate on the themes of what Junior actually thinks about and struggles with because I was reading it through this heightened, performative “voice.”
I love when things work or don’t so very differently for each reader. I LOVED that the “voice” was consistent throughout the book, it helped me stay focused on Junior’s life versus my own. But I can see where it might grate, as you explain it.
For me, that voice made the book. I despise when authors write books in first person generically. I’m not here for bland anyone could have written this. I’m here to listen to this narrator be this narrator. It doesn’t read as performative to me at all. Just Junior being himself.
Hm, I just compare this to like, Rainbow Rowell, or John Green, who are both extremely evocative and, I think, manage to completely capture the essence of a character, but it’s not done in a way with twee quirks of the prose. I think there is a difference between “generic” and this style, which seems extra theatrical.
Agree! I just mentioned in another review how I hate when authors do that — even if it’s just dialogue and 10x as much when it’s the narration. It worked okay here but still bugged me
SUPER glad it wasn’t just me :p
I also hated this aspect of Room.
Once again, I’m late to the party, as I had the longest day ever at work. I reviewed this back in April, having listened to it in audio book in pretty much one sitting. Because of this, I didn’t get the amazing art work. I only discovered that when I bought the book in the US this summer. I love the different art styles, and how it adds a totally new dimension to a book I was pretty blown away by the first time around.
I found Junior’s voice a bit distracting at first, but very quickly got immersed in the story and then the voice was perfect to me.
The way he describes the poverty, as just a terrible, sad fact of his life broke my heart. The chapter at the beginning where they have to kill the dog had me in floods of tears (which is not exactly convenient when you’re in the grocery store, listening to an audio book) and his subsequent descriptions of the sad reality of his and his family’s lives made me both sad and furious. It’s great that Junior gets a chance to get out, but so tragic that his parents never got the chance and that his sister didn’t have the opportunity to reach her full potential.
I would not be brave enough to listen to this as an audiobook. The print version definitely had me tearing up!
oh goodness. I flirted with the idea of listening to this after having read it, since it was on sale, but I couldn’t quite bring myself to commit to it.
The potential that Junior has, and that so many of the other characters we meet have, and how it goes nowhere for most of them breaks my heart because there are so many people and former students which I witnessed also may have affected my reaction to Junior.
The story of his sister broke my heart.