Why I Adore All Things Andrew Smith

Here's a story.

A few years ago I sat, bored out of my mind, needing to shed like a tortoise his shell the cubicle my mother, brother, and I called our bedroom. I called my brother up. "Yo, bro! Take me to the bookstore."

"Sure thing. Soon as I get home from school," he said.

So we went. I had no idea what I was looking for, just something I'd never read or considered reading before. Thus, I chose The Marbury Lens. Let me tell you, that day I made a choice I did not understand.

All night I flipped page after page after page, wholly fascinated by this kidnapped boy named Jack and all the tap. tap. tap.-ing in his life. The world of Marbury swept me away, this gruesome sub-fantasy that both awes and terrifies. Also, Andrew Smith's inviting prose added an even deeper layer of suspended disbelief.

Beautiful? Yes.

Transcendent? Yes.

Utterly life-altering? Oh yes.

Through my mother, brother and father rousing, dressing, leaving for their day, I read. It wasn't until I looked up at my clock--3:30pm--that I realized, if I didn't hurry, I'd be late for work. Thankfully, I still wore work-appropriate attire from the day before. A quick change of shirt and spread of deodorant stick, and I was out the door, my mind forever blasted by Marbury, Jack, and Andrew Smith. Again, I knew not what choice I'd made. Soon as I got to work (my first ever library job), I sat down at my computer and ILL-ed every single additional Andrew Smith title I could find.

For months, I followed Andrew Smith's self-deprecating blog. And once more, I fell in love, this time with the man himself. He was so reachable, always commenting and responding to comments a core group left on his blog. Part of me kept thinking, Why has no one ever heard of this guy? Why is [insert YA author] popular and this guy isn't? Whatever the answer, I began to revel in the glory and wonder and strangeness that is the world of Andrew Smith.

Next was In the Path of Falling Objects--a chilling, haunting read. Then Ghost Medicine--a literary endeavor rife with beautiful language and searing character portrayal. I particularly recall fiending for Stick, and that book shook me to my core. It was the first time I'd realized, amid my battling parents who drove proverbial knives into each other's backs on Christmas Day, that my own mother and father utilized abusive language to keep their children in check, to underpin us, language that, in the end, forces me to this day to question my objectives, question my motives, question the person I'm shaping into. Though I've transmogrified these "questions" into positive thoughts and actions, I could not help but understand my parents in a whole new way. It took me a long time to forgive them after that particular blowup. I shudder to think how I mightn't have noticed their personal demons--reaping their pounds of flesh throughout my bizarre childhood--had I not been reading Andrew Smith's most stirring, beautiful, tender work-to-date. Stick changed my life.

You all probably know Andrew Smith by his latest works, the books that thrust him into the spotlight--deservedly so! Winger and Grasshopper Jungle and 100 Sideways Miles. While I love Winger, I found it more hilarious than moving; I do, however, love and understand everyone's compulsion to weep full-heart at the end. His words are beautiful! I am pumped for Stand-Off, Ryan Dean West's return to YA.

Let me tell you: Grasshopper Jungle destroyed me. In the same way I'd been introduced to Andrew Smith, I now knew him on a whole other level. Not only was this the first time I'd ever--EVER--read a book from the perspective of a bisexual narrator (EVER!), Austin Szerba, while he did not remind me wholly of Jack, his voice recalled classic Andrew Smith. And that's when I knew it, that's when I truly knew why I worshiped this man's stories, this man's words. He's a fucking genius; moreover, we are watching classic literature, books that will be read in classrooms forever like Kerouac or Hemingway or Vonnegut or Lee before him, being written. The gravity of that just bowls me over every time, and that's what reading Grasshopper Jungle felt like.

If A.S. King is the modern Atwood, Andrew Smith wholly embodies Vonnegut. I love his every word, and you should too.