EVERYTHING'S COMING UP TINY
will grayson, will grayson by John Green and David Leviathan
My latest recommendation, book-wise, is this really fantastic read written in a really interesting way - each of its authors wrote four of the first eight chapters in a different character’s point-of-view. After that, they read one another’s work and collaborated on how to bring the two characters together and extend each’s story. It’s totally compelling. The characters are interesting and as loveable as they are often frustrating. Tiny Cooper is now one of my favorite book characters ever. The commentary on relationships, and friendships in particular, is moving and insightful. The characters’ varied sexual orientations are treated like any other aspect of a character - significant but not the point; not the point of who they are nor the part they play in their own stories.
Also, how could I not love a book that so cleverly uses Schrodinger’s cat as an ongoing conceit? :p
♥♥♥ EXCERPT♥♥♥
So Tiny squeezes into his chair, I am duly amazed, and then he turns to me and he whispers really loudly because secretly he wants other people to hear, “I’m in love.” I roll my eyes, because he falls in love every hour on the hour with some poor new boy. They all look the same; skinny and sweaty and tan, the last an abomination, because all February tans in Chicago are fake, and boys who fake tan - I don’t care whether they’re gay - are ridiculous.
“You’re so cynical,” Tiny says, waving his hand at me.
“I’m not cynical, Tiny,” I answer. “I’m practical.”
“You’re a robot,” he says. Tiny thinks that I am incapable of what humans call emotion because I have not cried since my seventh birthday, when I saw the movie All Dogs Go to Heaven. I suppose I should have known from the title that it wouldn’t end merrily, but in my defense, I was seven. Anyway, I haven’t cried since then. I don’t really understand the point of crying. Also, I feel that crying is almost - like, aside from deaths of relatives or whatever - totally avoidable if you follow two very simple rules: 1. Don’t care too much. 2. Shut up. Everything unfortunate that has ever happened to me has stemmed from failure to follow one of the rules.
“I know love is real because I feel it,” Tiny says.
Apparently, class has started without our knowing, because Mr. Applebaum, who is ostensibly teaching us precalculus but is mostly teaching me that pain and suffering must be endured stoically, says, “You feel what, Tiny?”
“Love!” says Tiny. “I feel love.” And everyone turns around and either laughs or groans at Tiny, and because I’m sitting next to him and he’s my best and only friend, they’re laughing and groaning at me, too, which is precisely why I would not choose Tiny Cooper as my friend. He draws too much attention. Also, he has a pathological inability to follow either of my two rules. And so he waltzes around, caring too much and ceaselessly talking, and then he’s baffled when the world craps on him. And, of course, due to sheer proximity, this means the world craps on me, too.
After class, I’m staring into my locker, wondering how I managed to leave The Scarlet Letter at home, when Tiny comes up with his Gay-Straight Alliance friends Gary (who is gay) and Jane (who may or may not be - I’ve never asked), and Tiny says to me, “Apparently, everyone thinks I professed my love for you in precalc. Me in love with Will Grayson. Isn’t that the silliest crap you ever heard?”
“Great,” I say.
“People are just such idiots,” Tiny says. “As if there’s something wrong with being in love.”
Gary groans then. If you could pick your friends, I’d consider Gary. Tiny got close with Gary and Jane and Gary’s boyfriend, Nick, when he joined the GSA during my tenure as a member of the Group of Friends. I barely know Gary, since I’ve only been hanging around Tiny again for about two weeks, but he seems like the normalest person Tiny has ever befriended.
“There’s a difference,” Gary points out, “between being in love and announcing it in precalc.” Tiny starts to talk and gary cuts him off. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. You have every right to love Zach.”
“Billy,” says Tiny.
“Wait, what happened to Zach?” I ask, because I could have sworn Tiny was in love with a Zach during precalc. But forty-seven minutes have passed since his proclamation, so maybe he’s changed gears. Tiny hs had about 3,900 boyfriends - half of them Internet-only.
Gary, who seems as flummoxed by the emergence of Billy as I am, leans against the lockers and bangs his head softly against the steel. “Tiny, you being a makeout whore is so not good for the cause.”
I look way up at Tiny and say, “Can we quell the rumors of our love? It hurts my chances with the ladies.”
“Calling them ‘ladies’ doesn’t help either,” Jane tells me.
♥♥♥♥♥♥
I want to talk at length on the use of the conceit, but I charge you - instead - to read the book. There are other great bits and pieces in it, too. Such as:
i feel like my life is so scattered right now. like it’s all these small pieces of paper and someone’s turned on the fan. but talking to you makes me feel like the fan’s been turned off for a little bit. like things could actually make sense. you completely unscatter me, and i appreciate that so much.
and
”I will base your character upon the attributes of the boulders on the lakeshore: silent, apathetic, and - considering how little they exercise - surprisingly chiseled.”
Touching, funny, thoughtful… Lots of great stuff. Even the writing that is meant to be bad is good :p
Such as…
hang me
like a dead rose
preserve me
and my petals won’t fall
until you touch them
and i dissolve
and
TINY COOPER HATES ‘OVER THE RAINBOW’
and this text involving the writing of a school musical:
WHAT RHYMES WITH SODOMY TRIAL?
LOBOTOMY VILE?
BOTTOM ME, KYLE?
BOTTOMY GUILE!
BTW - IT’S 4 THE SCENE WHEN OSCAR WILDE’S GHOST COMES TO ME IN A DREAM.
Furthermore? Rarely has the ending of a book made me smile quite so much with quite so many tears in my eyes. It’s really, really lovely.
Andbutso open up the box, people! It’s worth it.
My latest recommendation, book-wise, is this really fantastic read written in a really interesting way - each of its authors wrote four of the first eight chapters in a different character’s point-of-view. After that, they read one another’s work and collaborated on how to bring the two characters together and extend each’s story. It’s totally compelling. The characters are interesting and as loveable as they are often frustrating. Tiny Cooper is now one of my favorite book characters ever. The commentary on relationships, and friendships in particular, is moving and insightful. The characters’ varied sexual orientations are treated like any other aspect of a character - significant but not the point; not the point of who they are nor the part they play in their own stories.
Also, how could I not love a book that so cleverly uses Schrodinger’s cat as an ongoing conceit? :p
♥♥♥ EXCERPT♥♥♥
So Tiny squeezes into his chair, I am duly amazed, and then he turns to me and he whispers really loudly because secretly he wants other people to hear, “I’m in love.” I roll my eyes, because he falls in love every hour on the hour with some poor new boy. They all look the same; skinny and sweaty and tan, the last an abomination, because all February tans in Chicago are fake, and boys who fake tan - I don’t care whether they’re gay - are ridiculous.
“You’re so cynical,” Tiny says, waving his hand at me.
“I’m not cynical, Tiny,” I answer. “I’m practical.”
“You’re a robot,” he says. Tiny thinks that I am incapable of what humans call emotion because I have not cried since my seventh birthday, when I saw the movie All Dogs Go to Heaven. I suppose I should have known from the title that it wouldn’t end merrily, but in my defense, I was seven. Anyway, I haven’t cried since then. I don’t really understand the point of crying. Also, I feel that crying is almost - like, aside from deaths of relatives or whatever - totally avoidable if you follow two very simple rules: 1. Don’t care too much. 2. Shut up. Everything unfortunate that has ever happened to me has stemmed from failure to follow one of the rules.
“I know love is real because I feel it,” Tiny says.
Apparently, class has started without our knowing, because Mr. Applebaum, who is ostensibly teaching us precalculus but is mostly teaching me that pain and suffering must be endured stoically, says, “You feel what, Tiny?”
“Love!” says Tiny. “I feel love.” And everyone turns around and either laughs or groans at Tiny, and because I’m sitting next to him and he’s my best and only friend, they’re laughing and groaning at me, too, which is precisely why I would not choose Tiny Cooper as my friend. He draws too much attention. Also, he has a pathological inability to follow either of my two rules. And so he waltzes around, caring too much and ceaselessly talking, and then he’s baffled when the world craps on him. And, of course, due to sheer proximity, this means the world craps on me, too.
After class, I’m staring into my locker, wondering how I managed to leave The Scarlet Letter at home, when Tiny comes up with his Gay-Straight Alliance friends Gary (who is gay) and Jane (who may or may not be - I’ve never asked), and Tiny says to me, “Apparently, everyone thinks I professed my love for you in precalc. Me in love with Will Grayson. Isn’t that the silliest crap you ever heard?”
“Great,” I say.
“People are just such idiots,” Tiny says. “As if there’s something wrong with being in love.”
Gary groans then. If you could pick your friends, I’d consider Gary. Tiny got close with Gary and Jane and Gary’s boyfriend, Nick, when he joined the GSA during my tenure as a member of the Group of Friends. I barely know Gary, since I’ve only been hanging around Tiny again for about two weeks, but he seems like the normalest person Tiny has ever befriended.
“There’s a difference,” Gary points out, “between being in love and announcing it in precalc.” Tiny starts to talk and gary cuts him off. “I mean, don’t get me wrong. You have every right to love Zach.”
“Billy,” says Tiny.
“Wait, what happened to Zach?” I ask, because I could have sworn Tiny was in love with a Zach during precalc. But forty-seven minutes have passed since his proclamation, so maybe he’s changed gears. Tiny hs had about 3,900 boyfriends - half of them Internet-only.
Gary, who seems as flummoxed by the emergence of Billy as I am, leans against the lockers and bangs his head softly against the steel. “Tiny, you being a makeout whore is so not good for the cause.”
I look way up at Tiny and say, “Can we quell the rumors of our love? It hurts my chances with the ladies.”
“Calling them ‘ladies’ doesn’t help either,” Jane tells me.
♥♥♥♥♥♥
I want to talk at length on the use of the conceit, but I charge you - instead - to read the book. There are other great bits and pieces in it, too. Such as:
i feel like my life is so scattered right now. like it’s all these small pieces of paper and someone’s turned on the fan. but talking to you makes me feel like the fan’s been turned off for a little bit. like things could actually make sense. you completely unscatter me, and i appreciate that so much.
and
”I will base your character upon the attributes of the boulders on the lakeshore: silent, apathetic, and - considering how little they exercise - surprisingly chiseled.”
Touching, funny, thoughtful… Lots of great stuff. Even the writing that is meant to be bad is good :p
Such as…
hang me
like a dead rose
preserve me
and my petals won’t fall
until you touch them
and i dissolve
and
TINY COOPER HATES ‘OVER THE RAINBOW’
and this text involving the writing of a school musical:
WHAT RHYMES WITH SODOMY TRIAL?
LOBOTOMY VILE?
BOTTOM ME, KYLE?
BOTTOMY GUILE!
BTW - IT’S 4 THE SCENE WHEN OSCAR WILDE’S GHOST COMES TO ME IN A DREAM.
Furthermore? Rarely has the ending of a book made me smile quite so much with quite so many tears in my eyes. It’s really, really lovely.
Andbutso open up the box, people! It’s worth it.