Customer Reviews

Necessary Noise: Stories About Our Families as They Really Are

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I picked up Necessary Noise while standing in a local bookstore and starting reading the story, "The Visit" by Walter Dean Meyers. In fact, I read most of it, and then rushed home to order it from Amazon. Yes, it's a sad story, but it appeals to most of my students. I teach in a low socio-economic urban school district in south Texas. Unfortunately, the majority of my students have experience with a relative being in jail and/or prison. I put the book out for SSR time with a recommendation that "The Visit" is an outstanding story. By the end of the week, so many of my 9th grade students had read the story that they asked if we could have a book circle discussion of it. It's hard to believe, but my students really thought they hated reading back in August. I have finally conviced them that when you find the right book or story, reading is one of the greatest pleasures in life.

What is normal when it comes to families? Our society likes to picture families as functional and unbroken units that ideally consist of a mother and father {married}, with a certain number of children. Although what society would like to see and what is realistic is very different. The eye-opening novel, Necessary Noise, edited by Michael Cart, shows todays' families as they really are. In the ten young adult stories, a variety of characters deal with their fractured and dysfunctional families, whether they be their entire community or very best friend. Among the accomplished writers in this book are Lois Lowry, whose story Snowbound proves a laugh-out-loud tale about a relatively normal family that is astounded when their once preppy college daughter, comes home with her grotesque and lazy boyfriend who seems to have turned them into non-mammal eating hippies {vegetarians.} Walter Dean Meyers' chronicle Visit is a depressing story about a fathers' visit to his son on death row. This heartfelt story follows their last conversations, final memories, and feelings of deep guilt and shame. Personally, I found this book too splendidly truthful to resist. Therefore, I couldn't help but devour the pages one moving story at a time. Through evey volume a feel of realism shone bright, as did the emotions of hate, love, and confusion. Consider picking up this extraordinary novel for a closer look at families in a whole new manner.

Fifty years ago, unconventional families were ignored. The media liked to pretend that the only families that existed consisted of two parents, two kids, a dog, and a house with a white picket fence. Today, we know about and see all kinds of families, from those with two mothers to those where the kids have to run the house.

Ten of the best authors in teen literature have contributed stories on families that run from the caring to the dysfunctional. Walter Dean Myers writes about a father who visits his son on death row. Emma Donoghue never shows the parents of her story's streetwise characters, but their presence is felt. In the verse style of WHAT MY MOTHER DOESN'T KNOW, Sonya Sones writes about a sister with a scary dual personality. Love, rivalry and devotion are shown in many ways --- between mothers, fathers, children, brothers, and sisters.

If you only have ten minutes here or there to catch a quick read, NECESSARY NOISE is the perfect choice for you. All of the stories are easy to read, but none of them are superficial. The clean, talented writing and range of emotion and styles will give you plenty to think about. It doesn't matter what kind of family you have, because the themes that run through these stories are important to everyone.

--- Reviewed by Carlie Kraft

We ordered the book in hope of getting it for Valentine's Day, around February 14. Have yet to receive it as of March 18. ??