The Beast

I purchased this book for my son as a summer reading assignment. It was a quick read and he with a relatable storyline; you could see this occurring as it unfolded in the eyes of a teen.

For my daughter.

Walter Dean Myers is one of my favorite young adult authors because he pushes boundaries. On the other hand, I feel that he sometimes does not push the boundaries far enough. "The Beast" is a prime example of not pushing the boundary far enough, as heroin addiction is does not look as bad as it really is.Spoon leaves his home and girlfriend to go to a fancy prep school. When he returns, he does not recognize the world he left behind. Further, Spoon returns to find his girlfriend Gabi now "skin surfing" and a shadow of her former self. Stuck between two worlds, Spoon must help his girlfriend to save her from herself.While the structure of the story is sound, many questions are left unanswered. Why would Spoon take back his girlfriend, who has been shooting heroin. Normally, IV drug users are a big turn-off. What was Gabi doing to acquire heroin? I am certain she was not on an extended free sample program, so she had to earn it somehow. This also makes it very hard for me to believe that Spoon, or any right minded boy/man would take her back. Issues of diseases from needle sharing are only partly addressed. When/If these questions get answered, it would shift the whole dynamic of the story. But at the same time, it would also make the story much more realistic.

I finished this book yesterday, but had to give myself some time to think about it before writing anything down. There's a lot to say when you come across a book like this, the questions is always what can I say that will make other people want to read it?Of course there's the plot. A kid who grew up in Harlem goes to a private boarding school, only to come back over Christmas break and find everything has changed. His girlfriend is addicted to heroin, her younger brother is messing around in gangs, his friends have dropped out of high school. Suddenly he feels like an outsider in a place he has always considered his own. His territory. Where does he fit in now? Definitely not with the rich kids at his school, but not in the hood anymore either. He feels completely lost.For me, the most striking this was the language used to describe life in the hood. The poetry the author uses is extraordinary, but without making the spoken words cheesy or out of place. The main character describes everything around him, his sense of isolation, the flow of life around him, all these things with such accuracy that it's impossible not to relate to him even though I've lived in an upper middle class neighborhood my entire life.Maybe the most interesting thing (at least to me, the nerdy English major) is that the entire story takes place in about two weeks. It's not a conventional novel about drug abuse, there's no story of spiraling down, getting caught, trying to pick yourself back up. You only hear about that secondhand from his girlfriend, and again in a very poetic way. Instantly you get this sense of time flying by, of being out of control as things rush past and you racing to figure out how to deal with everything that's happening. I loved it. It was a completely brilliant choice. It's only 164 pages long, only took me an hour and a half to read, but it was so dense and powerful.There's a reason this man has more awards than I need to list and is acclaimed as one of the best young adult writers out there. This was definitely an awesome introduction to his work.

I teach in an inner-city urban school with 5th and 6th graders. While I had some minor concerns about the basis of the book's foundation about a meth addiction, I found that it true to form fit the lives and decisions my students often face in their own lives. In addition many of my students, have relatives, even parents, with this issue and they are constantly torn between this life and making good decisions for themselves. They love Walter Dean Myers and are always requesting more of his books. They particularly love this one, Street Love, Hoops, and The Game. If you are looking to grab the interest and get your students reading, this book will help you on your way. One more thing....if you are using it in a literature study, there are discussion questions at the back of the book to help guide your instruction. Happy reading!!!

I am an English teacher in an urban city, so I chose to do Walter Dean Myers as an author study and The Beast is, by far, my favorite book. (granted I read 8 books, not all of them). I do not want to give anything away, but the characters are so real, I felt their pain right along with them. Myers did an amazing job lettting us into the mind of Spoon, the main character, and the trials and tribulations that he struggles with. I even cried at the end of this novel, it was just so emotional! I absolutely LOVED this book and will be recommending it to all of my students this year!

This could have been an amazing, powerful novel. Walter Dean Myers portrays life on the streets in vivid detail, and the affection between Spoon and Gabi is convincing and compelling. However, the novel lacks focus. Supposedly this is the story of Spoon's battle to help Gabi overcome her drug addiction, but there's so much going on in these pages that Gabi feels like one of many subplots. We never really get to know or care for the characters as we should. There really isn't much of a struggle - despite the ambiguity of the end, Gabi's journey seems too facile and contrived. Spoon seems to spend as much time hanging out with his rich-kid friends as he does caring for Gabi. It's a pity that this novel doesn't live up to its rich promise, because there are some moments of beauty along the way that will leave you breathless.