Tim Federle: “Better Nate than Ever"

I’d rather not start with any backstory.

I’m too busy for that right now: planning the escape, stealing my older brother’s fake ID (he’s lying about his height, by the way), and strategizing high-protein snacks for an overnight voyage to the single most dangerous city on earth.

So no backstory, not yet.

Just....fill in the pieces. For instance, if I neglect to tell you that I’m four foot eight, feel free to picture me a few inches taller. If I also neglect to tell you that all the other boys in my grade are five foot four, and that James Madison (his actual name) is five foot *nine* and doesn’t even have to mow the lawn for his allowance, you might as well just pretend I’m five foot nine too. Five foot nine with broad, slam-dunking hands and a girlfriend (in high school!) and a clear, unblemished face. Pretend I look like that, like James Madison.

I do, except exactly opposite plus a little worse.

By the way, despite our tremendous height gap, he and I weigh the same. The school nurse told me that once: “James Madison was just in, before you,” she said, grinning like her news was a Christmas puppy, “and you weigh the exact same!” This is the one attribute at which I’m *not* below average: body heft....

-Gay snark starts early. You can be a closeted fifth grader and still have a well-developed bitchy sense of humor. This particular narrator will go on to observe that James Madison is “licking the Ritalin crumbs from his lips.” James will lunge at the narrator, Nate--just to be nasty--and Nate will scream “a little.” But, like any smart gay kid, Nate will “turn the shriek into a melody.” That’s what creative types do. This novel is Tim Federle turning his own shriek into a melody: making art out of something painful. The excessive weight, the absence of a girlfriend, the unimpressive stature, the blemished face, the inability to make a slam dunk: lemons, converted to lemonade.

-It’s a bit exasperating that someone could make a career change and pick up a pen and have such an obvious triumph, right away. The title of the novel--“Better Nate than Ever”--announces that the writer knows what he is doing. And the first sentence seems--to me--worthy of being canonical. “I’d rather not start with any backstory.” This tells us quite a bit. The narrator is bright; he has an awareness of story structure. He’s breathless; he has many schemes happening; this need to be in the midst of an elaborate plot is part of the force that is going to propel him toward a Broadway career (by the end of the book). He also doesn’t really know himself: He is telling us that he won’t give us backstory, but of course the next thing he does is give us a great deal of backstory. You can’t help but fall in love with this kid.

-I’m in awe of how much Tim Federle notices. The weird aggression of the nurse, hidden behind feigned chipper-ness. (As so much teacherly nastiness does tend to be hidden behind a big smile.) “You weigh the same as James Madison!” Why would anyone say that--unless she were deeply unhappy with herself, and needed some way to inflict pain on the powerless? That’s there, right on the second page. (And a killer simile: “Grinning like her news was a Christmas puppy.”) Gratuitous cruelty, an awareness of politics and power: “He lunged at me to make me scream a little....I screamed a little.” An interest in playacting, the ways that people preen before presenting themselves to the world: “I took my brother’s fake ID (he lied about his height)....” A brisk rejection of cliches: New York City is not “the greatest city in the world,” but “the most dangerous city in the world.” You can’t fake good writing. The novel seems to have a beating heart at its center; it wants to present a character previously absent from the world of children’s fiction; it begins with great authority, and then it never loses steam.

And that’s all for the summer. I’m away for the next week! Blog posts will resume in early September. Until then!

How to Host a Baby

-You have assumed responsibility for a mewling, puking ball of life, a yellow-lab pup. He will spit his half-digested kibble all over your shoes, all over your hard-cover edition of Jennifer Haigh's novel Faith . He will eat your tables, your chairs, your "I {Heart] Montessori" magnet, placed too low on the fridge. When you try to watch Bette Davis in Hush Hush Sweet Charlotte , on your TV, your dog will bark through the murder-prologue, for no apparent reason. He will whimper through Lena Dunham's Girls , such that you have to rewind several times to catch every nuance of Andrew Rannells's ad-libbing--and, still, you'll have a nagging suspicion you've missed something. Your dog will poop on the kitchen floor, in the hallway, between the tiny bars of his crate. He'll announce his wakefulness at 5 AM, 2 AM, or while you and another human are mid-coitus. All this, and you get outside, and it's: "Don't let him pee on my tulips!" When...

Raymond Carver: "What's in Alaska?"

Outside, Mary held Jack's arm and walked with her head down. They moved slowly on the sidewalk. He listened to the scuffing sounds her shoes made. He heard the sharp and separate sound of a dog barking and above that a murmuring of very distant traffic. She raised her head. "When we get home, Jack, I want to be fucked, talked to, diverted. Divert me, Jack. I need to be diverted tonight." She tightened her hold on his arm. He could feel the dampness in that shoe. He unlocked the door and flipped the light. "Come to bed," she said. "I'm coming," he said. He went to the kitchen and drank two glasses of water. He turned off the living-room light and felt his way along the wall into the bedroom. "Jack!" she yelled. "Jack!" "Jesus Christ, it's me!" he said. "I'm trying to get the light on." He found the lamp, and she sat up in bed. Her eyes were bright. He pulled the stem on the alarm and b...

My Favorite Pop Song

One thing I admire about Prince is his weirdly pretentious verses: Dream, if you can, a courtyard-- An ocean of violets in bloom. Also: Touch, if you will, my stomach. Feel how it trembles inside. No one else writes like this. Did people try to shoot down these choices? Did a producer say, "We'd like to rethink this one... Touch, if you will, my stomach...." I can't help but wonder. But it's the chorus that makes this a classic. It's direct and universal--and it ends with that bizarre flourish, the allusion to "the crying doves." (Prince's song was number one in America for quite a while; it defeated Bruce Springsteen's "Dancing in the Dark.") How can you just leave me standing-- Alone in a world that's so cold? Maybe I'm just too demanding. Maybe I'm just like my father--too bold. Maybe you're just like my mother; She's never satisfied. Why do we scream at each other? This is what it sounds like when doves cr...

Liars and Saints

Search This Blog