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This is the story of 16 year old Steve Harmon, an African American who is being accused of participating in a murder. Steve is an aspiring film maker and therefore tells the story through movie script format. �The film will be the story of my life. No, not my life, but of this experience....I�ll call it what the lady who is the prosecutor called me. MONSTER.� This keeps the story fast paced and highly engrossing. Alternately, we see journal entries that tell us what he is feeling during the time he finds himself in jail. It is through his journal that he truly expresses his emotion and tells us what happens when cameras stop rolling, so to speak. The fonts used make it fairly easy for |
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readers to follow the story. Anything dealing with the courtroom and the hearings is written in a font that resembles typewriter print, and the journal entries use a much bigger, less perfect font. The story is incredibly fast paced, and the scenes in the courtroom contain a high quantity of dialogue, which keeps readers breezing through the pages. Several movie making jargon are used and explained such as POV, CU, MS, LS, FADE IN/OUT, etc. Readers will find themselves deciding whether the narrator is indeed guilty of murder or simply a teenager who happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time. They will find that they can sympathize with both sides of the story and that the decision is at times difficult to make. The facts are presented, witnesses interviewed, and closing statements made, and the reader has absolutely no way of expecting the end. It is not at all a predictable ending. At all times, the author makes it possible for us to doubt just what the jury will decide.
Perhaps the biggest question of all in the end is, �Is Steve really a monster?� Readers are perfectly aware, but the narrator himself continues to have doubts. He seems to be convincing himself otherwise throughout the book, and when the lawyer refuses to hug him, he again asks himself, �What did she see that caused her to turn away? What did she see?� Kirkus Reviews speaks of the format saying, �The format of this taut and moving drama forcefully regulates the pacing; breathless edge-of-the-seat courtroom scenes written entirely in dialogue...� Booklist says, �Myers grapples with complex moral questions that will definitely make readers stop and think.� Truly a novel worthy of the many awards it has received such as: Michael L. Printz award for excellence in young adult literature, Coretta Scott King Award, and a Finalist of the National Book Award. An excellent and unforgettable book.
Myers, Walter D. 1999. Monster. New York: HarperCollins Children�s Books.
ISBN 0-06-028078-6. |
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