Cruise Control (Audio Cassette)

by Terry Trueman (Author), Andy Paris (Narrator)

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal
Grade 7 Up–Terry Trueman's novel (HarperTempest, 2004) is the companion to his debut work, Stuck in Neutral (July 2002, p. 66). In Cruise Control, the story of the McDaniel family's experience with a severely disabled son is told from the viewpoint of his brother Paul, a high school senior, straight A student, and all around athlete. Andy Paris provides the first person narration in a voice that sounds genuinely adolescent, wavering between bravado and self doubt, as Paul struggles with his long-time disrespect for his father, his love and shame for Shawn, and his violent tendencies on and off the basketball court. Shawn's story, in the first novel, presented the moral uncertainty of whether Mr. McDaniel was secretly plotting Shawn's mercy killing. In this one, Paul exposes his own viewpoint concerning his lot in life as Shawn's protector. Paris does a pitch-perfect rendering of Paul when drunk, spits out the jock's scatological patter, and takes pauses that both reflect Paul's changing perceptions of himself and his family and allow listeners to digest the emotional weight of this unflinchingly realistic look into the lives of those who live with and care for an individual who exhibits no sentient signs. All the characters–from Shawn and Paul, to their mother and sister, basketball players, and a swaggering young man Paul beats up–are carefully developed in this well-orchestrated plot that will appeal to both those who wonder about the fairness of life and those usually too busy with games or ego to reflect on the effects of their own temperamental actions.–Francisca Goldsmith, Berkeley Public Library, CA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist
Gr. 7-10. In this companion to Stuck in Neutral (2000), Trueman revisits the story of Shawn, the developmentally disabled teen whose point of view made that first novel so memorable. This time the narrator is Shawn's older brother, Paul, a gifted athlete. The irony of the family situation is not lost on Paul ("what a sadistic madman God must be to have thrown Shawn and me into the same family"). While Paul loves his brother, he hates their father, who, unable to cope, has abandoned the family. But Paul, like Shawn, is a victim of circumstance, and Trueman does a passionately convincing job portraying a boy who feels trapped and suffocated by responsibilities he never asked to shoulder. As he puts it, his life is "like a car roaring down the freeway in cruise control . . and I can't even slow down." Only at the end does the story stray briefly into wish-fulfillment territory, but by that time, readers will be so invested in Paul's survival that few will quibble. Michael Cart
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Audio Cassette
• Publisher: Recorded Books (August 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1419331094
• ISBN-13: 978-1419331091
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #2,217,452 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

  Popular in this category: (What's this?)

  #20 in

  Books > Children's Books > Authors & Illustrators, A-Z > ( T ) > Trueman, Terry

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Courtesy of Teens Read Too, April 1, 2006

By	TeensReadToo.com "Eat. Drink. Read. Be Merrier." (All Over the US & Canada) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Cruise Control (Paperback)

I have a confession to make. I actually wasn't going to start reading CRUISE CONTROL for another week or two. After all, I had just read Inside Out and Stuck in Neutral in quick succession. I have a lot of other books on my reviewing plate, and I didn't want anyone to think I had a Terry Trueman obsession. But then I decided, "I want to read this book now, I probably do have a Terry Trueman obsession, and no one is going to stop me!" So...that's my story, I'm sticking to it, and now for the story of CRUISE CONTROL...

This book is billed as the companion book to Stuck in Neutral, not a sequel. And for good reason. This book doesn't pick up where Stuck in Neutral leaves off, although I would recommend reading that one first, if for no other reason than to learn the history of Shawn McDaniel and his family. CRUISE CONTROL is the story of Paul McDaniel, older brother to Shawn and sister Cindy, son of a prize-winning poet father who abandoned their family and a mother who works hard to take care of her children.

Paul is fully aware of the unfairness and inconsistencies in his life. He's the star of the basketball team--his brother is a veg, confined to his wheelchair and unable to control any of his movements, from blinking his eyelids to swallowing his food. Paul is always angry, even to the point of physically attacking virtual strangers--his brother is unable to show any emotion, at all from love to annoyance. He hates his father for leaving the family--and yet wonders what it would be like for him to be a bigger part of it. Paul's life is, for all accounts and purposes, messed up. As his sister, Cindy, puts it: "There's no way I'll ever believe that the problems a brother like Shawn brings to a family are 'gifts from God.'"

As Paul discovers that his father might not have left the family due to abandonment, as his feelings of rage turn to shame for a secret he's kept way too long, Paul realizes the truth that his mother has long known: "It's okay to love your brother."

CRUISE CONTROL is Paul's story, and it's just as heartfelt and genuine as Shawn's. I'm sorry to leave the McDaniel family behind, but at least it's with the feeling of love and respect, and not sorrow and shame.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars An intimate look at the reality and power of anger and love, December 29, 2004

By	Stephanie A. Squicciarini "Teen Librarian" (Rochester, NY) - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: Cruise Control (Hardcover)

Terry Trueman does it again...brings readers an intense look into the heart and soul of a character without wasting a word! This powerful companion book to the award-winning book, Stuck in Neutral (a book that still haunts me), is told from Shawn's brother Paul's perspective. Paul McDaniel is very angry...at life, at his father, at his brother, but perhaps more importantly at himself - for a secret that is at the very core of this additional look at how one family deals with heartache and tragedy in very different ways. The reality of Paul's anger is at times difficult to watch with readers feeling the pain rage inside of him. Even with all of the anger, readers will see a loving side to Paul...the loving side that feeds his brother bits of potato chips and wants desperately to be sure that Shawn knows he is his brother. While not a sequel and a title that certainly stands on its own, Cruise Control adds another dimension to a story that continues to have readers talking and thinking about the potential for one life to mean something more than it appears on the surface.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A complex and moving companion novel to Stuck In Neutral, December 10, 2004

By	Teenreads.com (New York, NY) - See all my reviews (TOP 500 REVIEWER)

This review is from: Cruise Control (Hardcover)

In STUCK IN NEUTRAL, Terry Trueman's 2001 award-winning novel, he developed a most unlikely narrator: Shawn, a young man whose body is incapacitated by severe cerebral palsy, but whose mind is more engaged than anyone would have imagined. Now, Trueman gives Shawn's older brother Paul a voice in the companion novel CRUISE CONTROL.

Paul is pretty much the polar opposite of Shawn: he is popular, gifted, a jock who can trust his body to perform at the highest level. He's also deeply angry, with a quick temper and a tendency to fly off the handle. Much of Paul's anger is directed at his father, a writer who wrote a Pulitzer Prize-winning poem about Shawn after he left the family, and now seems to use Shawn mostly for photo ops and talk show appearances. Paul, who deeply loves his brother (even though he calls him a "veg"), resents his father for abandoning him and for escaping the day-to-day realities of living with a profoundly disabled family member.

CRUISE CONTROL is sometimes a disturbing book, as when the reader is taken into Paul's head as he beats up a complete stranger, or when Paul and his equally angry friend Tim drive drunk. Although STUCK IN NEUTRAL was perhaps a more powerful book, in part because of its unusual and surprising narrator, CRUISE CONTROL is still a complex and moving portrayal, even with its more conventional main character. Although each novel can stand on its own merits, STUCK IN NEUTRAL and CRUISE CONTROL gain strength when read together, as they form a more complete portrait of a family dealing with the daily heartbreak of Shawn's disability.

--- Reviewed by Norah Piehl