The setting of the story is modern-day New York City. The majority of the action takes place in a Manhattan courtroom where the young protagonist is on trial. The action switches between the courtroom, the detention center, and the scene of the crime. The author includes details about the setting as they might be visualized through the lens of a movie camera, and through the eyes of the narrator, Steve Harmon.
Myers writing style is engaging and original, with most of the story written in the format of a movie script, and the rest as handwritten diary entries. �Many elements of this story are familiar, but Myers keeps it fresh and alive by telling it from an unusual perspective.� (School Library Journal, July 1, 1999) In the dialogue, he uses the appropriate jargon and dialect of the different characters. The testimony of Bobo, a drug dealer, is laced with slang: �Man, this lame-looking brother with an attach� case come up to me and said he wanted to cop some rocks. I was so knocked out by this bourgie dude asking for crack that I slept the real deal. I laid the rocks on him and he slapped the cuffs on me.� (p. 184)
The plot does not unfold chronologically, but through flashbacks and snippets of Steve�s diary. The reader is initially made aware through Steve�s journal entries that he is in jail for a serious crime. His fear is conveyed in the opening pages, but the reason for his imprisonment only becomes clear as the trial progresses. The impression grows that Steve is an innocent, who was in the wrong place at the wrong time, and is taking the fall for criminals trying to work a deal for early release. The tension builds as the trial progresses, and Steve�s situation seems more and more helpless. The climax occurs when he is ultimately found not guilty.
Steve changes dramatically over the time covered by the story. He is yanked from his teenage world into the brutal criminal society of prison. He is forced to question everything he has done in his life that has led him to that point. He regrets the relationship he had with the hoods who perpetrated the crime, and wishes he could go back and re-script his life. The reader sees his vulnerabilities and fear while his fate hangs in the balance, and the way he channels that energy into a creative outlet after his release. Confronted with the question of who he really is leads to the challenge every teen ultimately faces: �I want to know who I am.� (p. 281)
Myers avoids a clich�d happy ending by the questions he raises after the verdict is read. When Steve turns to embrace his attorney, she turns away. Although his father was exultant over the outcome of the trial, afterward the distance between the two grows. �I understand the distance. My father is no longer sure of who I am.� (p. 280, 281) The reader gets the sense that the experience has caused him to question who he is, and what others see when they look at him. �I want to look at myself a thousand times to look for one true image. When Miss O�Brien looked at me, after we had won the case, what did she see that caused her to turn away? What did she see?� (p. 281)
Awards
Publishers Weekly Best Books of the Year
Michael L. Printz Award
Bluegrass Award
National Book Award (Nominee)
Edgar Awards (Nominee)
Relevant Websites
About Walter Dean Myers: http://www.scils.rutgers.edu/~kvander/myers.html
Meet the Author: http://www.eduplace.com/kids/hmr/mtai/wdmyers.html
HarperCollins Site: http://www.harperchildrens.com/authorintro/index.asp?authorid=12522
Source
Books in Print [database online]. Available from http://www.booksinprint.com. Accessed 14 November 2004.
School of Library and Information Studies
TEXAS WOMAN'S UNIVERSITY