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kimyoonmiauthor · 4 years

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Barnes and Nobles Bookstore Report 2020 on Diversity

For those who are new to this... What I do every year since I was 13 was go to the bookstore, usually in summer and take an overview look at what is being shelved and sold. This, of course, changed with the internet. It’s a way for me (and maybe you) to get a sense of what the industry is and isn’t doing, particularly with diversity. I also check local bookstores (But my local one is closed due to covid this year). I usually note what has an hasn’t changed. It’s something that authors should be doing anyway. I don’t do it more often because it’s usually depressing. And I don’t do it near holiday seasons, since that can skew the book selection unfairly. So I usually pick a non holiday-heavy month and one that will not skew my numbers (like say, February, which is Black History Month) I pay attention to the following: - Where the books are shelved. - How many times a book is shelved (in different areas) - Who gets the most real estate and a rough guess as to why. (Usually because they are white cis and male.... no lie) - Which diversity gets the most real estate - What are the labels on the shelves and if those are separate or different from previous years. - I generally skip the children’s section since there is a yearly report for that. - Demographics of the area visually apparent v. numbers of the area itself. Who are they supposed to sell to (and usually failing to sell to) Blame the Anthropology... I’m well-trained to look for such things. - All Bookends and displays. - I usually look at all sections of the bookstore and take notes, in order. - If I have access to internet, then I also look up the authors, if I can to find out their diversity and spread. - I also take lots of pictures.

These are my notes for this year.

Demographics of the area outside of the bookstore: About 50/50 with the majority being Latinx (Black and Latinx mainly) Mostly women. (It was early, though--maybe white) Last demographics of area 2010, granted 36,226 (71.1%) White, 2,573 (1.3%) Black, 531 (0.3%) Native American, 31,434 (16.4%) Asian (6.9% Filipino, 5.4% Korean, 1.3% Chinese), 122 (0.1%) Pacific Islander, 12,146 (6.3%) from other races, and 8,687 (4.5%) (Latinx is around 17%)

The first two bookcases at the front of the store, were mostly white cis male authors. In the new author case, this was true, as well, and mostly had well-knowns.

Considering the Latinx population, I’m always kinda feeling like why aren’t there more Latinx books on the shelves?

White and black authors. But the black authors are only there because of Black Lives Matter, which feels like it’s catering to the white people who want to know what this is about, rather than the demographics of the bookstore itself. The Magazine section, Vogue, in particular did have PoCs on it.

- The Art History Section is and always is really white. I could count the PoCs on the shelf of 6 tall shelves on one hand. All of the How to draw Manga books are by white people. I know this because I’ve looked up the authors in the past. And it’s not that Japanese don’t publish books in English with instructions, BTW... so I always find that a bit strange, especially since the author they choose doesn’t really have a manga style 100% but mixes in American Comic books. (But that’s a separate thing.) They mostly had known PoC artists, acceptable to white people. - The Cookbooks don’t cover Africa. They had one African American cookbook which interested me. (Labeled Soul food and had a Black author), but the books mostly were for “French” in the international section. A few Korean (2-3) and I didn’t spot many other regionalities. I looked for Indian, for example.

- There were SFF books front of the store, which surprised me. Might be because there were PoC authors and the majority were PoC. (Also Black Lives Matter skewing) - All of the seating was removed (probably because of covid) I usually use it to sort through books I want...

- No Surprise, the same location for featured “classics” as last year and all but one were written by white men. The token book? Arabian Nights. I’m not sure that really counts since it was compiled by a white guy. (Believe me, I had thought like where is Jorge Borges? Marquez? etc) Most of the authors were white cis and het too... - The recommended section... by looking, mostly white cis het men. - Danielle Steele was shelved in General Fiction section. Actually several genres were shelved together there. Some Science Fiction, Some Fantasy, Some Romance, Some Historical Fiction, etc. There was no special section for Historical Fiction. (Not popular? Used to be back in the day...) There’s no LGBTQIA, women’s or African American section, even in the non-fiction. I have mixed feelings about taking it out of the non-fiction section. I like it combined in the Fiction section. They also took out all of the sub labeling except for major transitions. (Labeling individual shelves as containing something) - Diminished Latinx books in the Classics (Shelf) section. This has not changed... and it still ticks me off how white and cis het (also leans towards male) it is. - Increased black authors overall. Octavia Butler was Shelved twice, for example. Toni Morrison got a bookshelf all to herself (probably because of her recent passing). Nnedi Okorafor actually showed up on the shelf. Rena Barron was triple shelved--once at the front of the store and in two sections of the bookstore... So apparently B&N have a lot of faith in her book. - Overall, improved balance between men and women (except in the classics and recommended sections. I feel stabby about that.)

- The covers were a lot less offensive overall. (Though I had a few head scratchers on why that cover for that book, but that’s getting into graphic design quibbles) The PoC books actually had PoCs on the cover. And some of the covers were redone to have PoCs on the cover. There were no sexualized women on the out turned books. The Mystery/Thriller books, for example, has a trend of being symbolic and drawn. Kinda felt like I was staring at the old Chick Lit.

- There were less books shelved overall, because of the shelving practices of out turning the books so people could see the covers. (Even less than last year)

- The Romance Section ticked me off since I could count the amount of PoCs on the cover with one hand. But the covers have improved a bit. Jim Hines won the cover war... There was ONE LGBT book and ONE interracial book. It’s like PoCs don’t fall in love at all. What gives?

- Science Fiction and Fantasy were separated again. The amount of shelves for YA and SFF were about equal. (Which drastically changed from last year). This meant that the genre fiction was mostly equally shelved. (Mystery/Thriller might have gotten a smidgen less). The Science Fiction section was astoundingly male cis het. I even looked for authors I knew who were queer/poc, etc and couldn’t find them. Anne McCaffrey was gone completely, BTW. Oh and JK Rowling didn’t make it to the main shelves (She was in the audiobook section). lol Someone was mad. So win one, lose the rest.

- All of the “recommended race” books were written by People of color and well known. Win~ But all on black-white relations except one. (A book on my wishlist, but I pre-promised myself to not buy anything... so it was difficult to leave that one behind...) - The people with the most shelving were Shakespeare (Got his own section), Stephen King, and I forgot the third author, but he’s male cis and het too... Yeah... I know. And yes, there are authors more prolific than these authors too in history who are also PoC. - All of the books were from known and popular authors rather than unknown authors, mainly. Not like that rare find where you’re browsing and you go, “OMG, never heard of this person before.” So for me, who likes to browse and find that rare find it’s not as fun. I’ve found books pre-internet that were like that in Barnes and Nobles no less.

Overall: Improved, but I have this irking feeling the increase in black books is specifically to the Black Lives Matter movement. They care more about publicity than the cause, otherwise, other PoC groups wold have gotten better rep. Also kinda sad at the lack of LGBT. The widest diversity in the store is still YA. And as every year, I’m super sad about the lack of rep for Latinx. Seriously, didn’t you give it a thought that you might be in an area that’s not white? (I know the “But you could complain” thing... but it never worked in the past either and I have written to corporate, just so you know.) I pretty much left with this feeling of elation that it was improved, but this feeling of sickness that they were still, STILL catering to white people. (Cis het, etc). Yeah, depressing enough to want to marathon several PoC shows to undo the implicit bias type of feeling. And this area, as shown isn’t lacking in PoCs. Also, kinda have to state, I wish it was more like a treasure hunt... sometimes that’s the best part of going to a bookstore. Disappointed about the lack of a non-fiction LGBTQIA... kinda had a wish the Julie Sondra Decker might show up in that section. My ace little heart. I took 108 pictures as photo proof of my assertions (Again, Anthro training). BTW, Rena Barron should thank her publicist for convincing for the triple shelving...

#bookstore #barnes and nobels books #diversity

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goldenscript · 7 years

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the taste of ambrosia (among other things)

pairing: min yoongi | reader genre: kiki’s delivery service au / fluff word count: 8,029 description: Min Yoongi has always been content with his life as a feline, really, it’s all he’s ever known, but he would be lying if he said he never once imagined what life was like with two legs instead of four. At least until you came along. author’s note: happy (late) 18th birthday to my majo bun aka @jungnoir! i figured i might as well write out your fantasies for jiji!yoongi, and even though this is late i hope this mini monster makes up for it. ilysm bb! <3

Desires take form in dreams, in wishes. They’re the sorts of things that cause trouble for people, because sometimes they’ll spend endless days and nights trying to get a taste. It’s akin to ambrosia—a gift from the gods above, like a nectar not just of the sweetest affirmations but the tangy bursts of tangibility. It’s there. Right in the center of calloused palms is a fallen petal from the cherry blossom tree in winter. But, that’s the thing. This is something so fleeting and so potent for the weak-hearted. It’s all hard to believe anyone can get it because as all things do, they fall.

Or, more or less, land uncomfortably.

Min Yoongi has a particularly rough landing, giving a particularly feral snarl to no one aside from the viridescent and burnt sienna expanse. He bites back the snark at the tip of his tongue as his canine companion motivates him to move forth with the prodding of a hazel-speckled paw. Not that the insufferable brat would even hear him anyway.

This isn’t the first time Taehyung ordered and (literally) sent him to do out-of-the-way tasks; oftentimes, he was out venturing the small town with a plastic bag in tow or Jimin himself to haul the wagon just to get it to the cursed, (not-so) little witch. They’ve never been anything far-fetched. Usually a root of mandrake or a sprig of baby’s breath, maybe a delivery made on his behalf, but these trips have become farther and frequent as of late with the difficulty of spells only increasing.

Of course, it’s only expected when the three of them have all been born and bred for this kind of thing.

Growing up with Taehyung prepared and primed him for a life of companionship over servitude. Throughout the years, this became more than just a contract between magical beings unlike how most people could see it on the outside. In-between the large bouts of duty came laughter over frivolous things, late nights where they poured out all their anxieties and excitements for a future so close yet so far, birthdays and holidays celebrated to its fullest effects, failed spells that have left him with a few resentments (after all, he swears his tail is hell of a lot shorter than it should’ve been after that lengthening charm), and successful spells that had Taehyung crying and him trying not to.

All of which spanned across a set of twenty-one years when he came four years after the aforementioned came into existence. Yoongi has seen him grow up and become someone that’s only gotten better at his craft with each passing year. He’s still trying no matter how hard it’s been (and they both can honestly say it’s been plenty hard).

Such a ripe, young age for that witch’s profession, but he knows his long-time friend will go places, far and untouched by others, with him and Jimin tagging right along. This is just one of those steps to help expand the young boy’s dream, where the two familiars can do things the former can’t when exams and practices run higher stakes.

During moments of stillness, the kind that comes with trekking through endless kilometers of hundred-acre woods, leaves Yoongi to his thoughts. He drowns out the quips that Jimin is yapping about, not that it’s important very much anyway. The very same contemplation of the night before resumes—this time, it’s existence.

There’s usually no set conclusion, of course, asides from the bitter fact that at some point everyone will become translucent wisps floating around the world to either take up a new form or just to engage in the lush, multicolored meadows with images on their soles touching the ground and chloroplast painting pictures on their skins. Beyond all of that, it’s hard to say much else. Maybe consider what everything is all about or if there are things one wished they could have in this life. He’s only ever considered between wanting to be human and wanting to sleep for a whole year. His motivations in its entirety come in his nature, a natural affiliation for sleep and recuperation from all the strenuous tasks given to him for sixteen years and a natural instinct that may have others consider calling him a cliché—curiosity.

He hears a lot of what humanhood is like, sees it for what it is from his very skewed perspective, and understands it only so much before his brain gets completely thrown into overdrive and he has to snap at the other person to talk in a language he can understand before he storms off to sleep off all the yearning that constricts his chest like a coil only tightening each time he tries to soothe the pangs.

Feeling so sad over something so trivial is silly. It’s childish. This is that sort of feeling one is always so certain they’ve outgrown well past their prepubescent years when all the questions and hopes are at their highest peaks. He’s come to terms with the fact that he would never be human, that his fate as a feline will be his fate from start to finish. It’s not quite so bad anyway.

He can sleep whenever he pleases for however long until he’s needed, his food is provided to him because he simply can’t reach, and he gets lots of affection just from being this furry, soft-looking creature despite how cold-hearted he really is on the inside. His life is pretty much set for him, even more privileged than most since his own quips and needs can actually be heard unlike the regulars. However, he still feels largely unhappy.

He yearns to see the world at a higher peak, to understand what two legs are like if only just to know if it’s as tiresome as Taehyung claims, and to feel love because he hears that it’s different when you’re human. Not just in who you love but in the magnitude, because love as a cat is minimal. It’s considered superficial, really. You see your potential lover, and suddenly the whole world stops—it’s akin to love at first sight, according to Taehyung. But in a way, Yoongi’s never been fond of those sorts of things.

Stepping across a fallen log, Jimin no longer yipping over something that happened in town during his last delivery, Yoongi becomes particularly immersed in his idea of love. It’s slow and steady, the kind that happens after time, leaving only more and more curiosity in its wake. To him, love is far more like the universe. A place of wonder, of vastness, and of understanding that make take ages to comprehend but it’s that effort that really culminates it well past infatuation and into actual, wholesome love.

He’s certain that the right one comes by chance, by some circumstance that changes his whole world. Perhaps out of humanity, he just wants to be able to love someone as much as they love him, and to finally taste the rarity of ambrosia that so many have just once, if not twice. If only—

“Yoongi!” Jimin’s voice sounds exasperated, his snout nudging Yoongi’s back leg. “Didn’t you hear me?”

Looking at his friend with a scoff falling passed his lips, he asks, “No, ‘course not! I’ve had you drowned out since we landed. What do you want?”

“We’re here!” He follows Jimin’s snout, catching a glimpse of the cream-colored cottage. The mariana blue shingles on the top are U-shaped, almost like the poorly-drawn ruffles Taehyung used to make during arts-and-crafts but not as grotesque. The windows are screenless without the blinds drawn, only faint outlines of its contents to be seen as the two of them drew nearer.

The surrounding air dances with hints of vanilla and very faint traces of cinnamon, a very low humming emitting from the amicable home, even Yoongi finds his interest piqued. It’s almost like Taehyung’s with the homebody atmosphere a major staple for a witch, it’s the sort of place that makes you want to curl up into a ball and nap by the windowsill, maybe even drink tea by the porch just to get lost in their thoughts. It’s a comfortable place, it’s… well, it’s like back home. Even the small puffs of smoke floating away from the chimney has the pair getting closer and closer.

Patches of grass and peeks of calla lilies lead the two along the pathway, steps so careful not to trample on the Earth for fear that they might disturb the peace. It’s a habit, almost an involuntary action not to trip the balance in the presence of magic, where the world is at its purest. The music still continues, beckoning them forth with hearts laden in warmth and stars in their eyes, until they’re standing beneath the curved, white-frame doorway, peering inside. Starting from the dark mahogany floorboards, starting their way to their left to the well-decorated walls filled with photos of your friends and family, past the door-less entryway into what they assumed is the kitchen, on the other wall are a few pieces of art that neither of them try to decipher but there are some familiar-looking watercolor paintings, the dining room appears to be straight ahead with a large viney plant atop a table that matches the wood on the floors, and a compact, open space on the left, a large grey rug basically inviting Yoongi to lay down and nap upon.

Instead of waiting as expected, he does another quick once over ahead of him, not really straining very hard to confirm that you’re inside, before he slips inside and Jimin hastily following close behind.

He harshly whispers his name, brows furrowing ever-so-slightly from what Yoongi can see from the corner of his eye. “You can’t barge into someone’s home like

“The door was open. That’s basically inviting people inside.”

“I guess... hey!”

Yoongi continues on his way inside, finding a long corridor a little past the open space and the chimney on the far left of the dining area. It’s connected to the kitchen, a large open window where he catches a glimpse of your hair. He sees you swaying your hips and humming to the same song he heard upon entering but he can’t quite decipher where it’s from, but he doesn’t quite care to find out considering it isn’t terrible—he actually kinda likes it.

“Yoongi—!” Jimin’s voice disrupts the tranquility, earning a glare from the dark-haired feline.

“Shut up,” he glowers, recoiling onto his heels before jumping onto the counter.

Now he can see what you’re up to, throwing in sprigs of rosemary, a dash of glimmering scales, and giving the giant pot a stir. You’re donning a loose T-shirt and jeans with the same description and hair’s tied together loosely into a makeshift ponytail. He can’t tell what you look like or if you’ve noticed him or Jimin, but your back remains turned from the two of them and it makes him itch with a small inkling of curiosity, because did you look like? It wasn’t like he could tell from the photos hanging on the way, nor did he pay great, detailed attention to any of them. He just knew you had to be pretty, because Taehyung had a bit of a goofy look on his face when he talked about you (but the goof has always been a mess around other girls anyway).

Regardless, he does find out. It takes only a moment before grumbling Jimin decides that he’ll join him on the counter, recoiling onto his hind legs before giving a mighty leap. It falls short (as always), only his front paws making contact with the wood before he slowly slips down from the lack of grip and comes crashing into a heap on the floor.

It’s a loud sound that even has you jumping, causing Yoongi’s gaze to snap at his clumsy friend with a groan escaping his lips.

“You idiot, way to make an entrance.”

His paw catches his snout, small exasperated sigh sailing past his lips before he turns his body to watch you. He’s finally able to study your visage, the natural contours and the bright gleam in your eyes reminds him of the photo he saw by your doorway when you were beside Taehyung and another companion. Even when your eyes are glazed over in worry and hint of surprise, you still look at them with a smile on your lips.

A small laugh tumbles out as you place a hand on your hip, “you two do know that sneaking up on someone isn’t polite?”

“It’s also not safe to just leave your door wide open.”

You raise a brow at him, lips twitching as you state, “Well, it isn’t like many people wander around this area anyway.”

His shoulders rise, only to fall as Jimin finally pipes in: “Hello! You’re Y/N right? Taehyung sent me—my name’s Jimin—and Yoongi—over there—for stuff. I forget what it was.”

The white and hazel-colored canine looks over at him with his head slightly tilted, “d’ya remember?”

He gives an eyeroll, “Like I’d remember what that scatter brain needs.”

Jimin frowns slightly, looking at you with what would appear to be a pout to anyone else. (Yoongi knows he’s just trying not to get scolded if you’re that kind of person.) “Sorry, miss. I forget what we came for, but Tae sent us… if that helps. Heh.”

“Oh yes!” you exclaim, immediately clapping your hands before scurrying back into your kitchen. Jimin waits patiently, but Yoongi simply turns around just to watch you grab a few vials of whatever concoction you had cooking up. It has a alluring purple hue, with smoke wafting off the ladle as it slips into the glass before getting capped off by accompanying corks. There’s nothing familiar about any of them, only a hint of mint intermingled in the already too-sweet smelling air.

You return to the two of them as you place all the vials into a purple velvet drawstring pouch, setting the cargo in front of Jimin. This time he actually notices the small details like the lack of shoes adorning your feet, the loose hairs framing your face without much try, and the apron tied around your waist with one too many things all threatening to slip out of the pockets.

He doesn’t miss the dark brown wand sticking out from the largest one or the small vials and sprigs of herbs from the smaller ones. Each of them a familiar hue of a certain ability, all mashing a plethora of scents that didn’t smell like anything Taehyung tried cooking one time. They all seem to be arranged by shades, with an aquamarine shade punctuating the almost rainbow that hung precariously at the corner of the stained pocket.

He’s about to open his mouth to warn you, but as soon as your attention flits from Jimin to him, it falls and a puff of white ensues.

Of course, this is normal. Things like that always fall (mostly with the clumsy witches but they can’t help it sometimes). They’re usually those sorts of things that can sprout a flower right where it landed or even cause everyone in the close proximity to fall in love with the first thing they lay their eyes on. Simple things. They don’t usually hurt, and they most certainly wear off, but beyond the obvious uncertainty of what the vial was, what it does elicits a rush of deep pain and tingling that has him and what he can make out aside from the ringing of his ears are Jimin’s own whimpering that has him squinting through the dissipating white.

In place of white and hazel is the form of a boy with fair skin and brunet locks in disarray. If it wasn’t for his eyes, Yoongi would’ve dismissed him but he knows that damn pup anywhere and it has to be him. It’s weird to think, of course. He’s never once seen a familiar in their human form, let alone seen Jimin in his, but the years spent together even with the mask of indifference he holds so high into the sky, he can spot his friend anywhere.

It would’ve quirked a smile on his lips, if not for the sudden screech you let out as you quickly run into another room with things in hand and tossing it at the two of them.

“What the hell—” he snarls, catching what appears to be a T-shirt and a pair of fluorescent yellow shorts that could only belong to one horribly dressing boy he knew. But that isn’t what stops him short.

No, it’s the sight of milky fingers and the clench of a fist that most certainly belongs to him. His mouth immediately falls open, looking to you and then Jimin as the younger boy’s mouth falls open and his name parts the plump pink lips.

The nearest item in his mitts is a stray spoon laying off to the side, and his first action is to grab it in hopes of catching a glimpse of whatever change has come to him—well, truthfully, it was more or less to confirm that this was actually happening—and although even just grabbing it with his free hand is an odd sensation, his body acts so naturally and that makes the whole situation even more peculiar.

His heart is pounding so loudly in his chest he actually feels a hint of embarrassment as he catches a glimpse of what should’ve been a black Bombay cat but is that what he sees? No, what he sees is everything he’s only ever dreamt of in being a human—alabaster skin so smooth and supply it felt absolutely foreign and familiar all at once, hair as dark as his fur hung over his forehead with the tips kissing the lids of his eyes, and he was bare, almost positively without any form of clothing that he was used to carrying on his own back.

Compared to Jimin, who’s lean and quite built even in this form, he is thin and wiry, almost underweight if he thought back to human body standards. There were still traces of boyishness to his companion while he was a devoid of it, with traces of actual fatigue coating his visage because of this physical change.

Insteading firing questions your way, he shrugs on the clothes and flashes a lazy smile toward you and Jimin when he catches a sight of the leaking bag on the ground, “Have fun you two.”

The brunet laughs, adjusting his shirt as he waves him off. “Of course.” It sounds like a scoff, but the traces of playfulness only has the older man grinning a little more now that his back is turned to them.

“What? Where are you going?” you ask, blinking and brows furrowing. He knows he should probably stick around to hear what’s supposed to happen now, maybe even fix whatever was done, but he doesn’t want to hear it or fix it for that matter. In fact, all he really wants to do is feel the rug beneath him and fall into the void of slumber.

Glancing at you from over his shoulder, he says simply, “M’gonna nap.”

—

When Yoongi wakes by Jimin’s hand, he has to refrain from trying to bare his fangs at the latter though the small canines still manage to strike some fear. It seems that while he was out, you explained to Jimin the simple gists that this would be temporary for a few more days and that the broken vials would need to be replaced so the journey back to Taehyung would also take much longer (a week maximum). And it’s all these things that send relief coursing through his body. For once in his life, his dreams have come true.

The taste of humanity has always been fleeting and far, the sort of thing that could only happen if he pushed his subconscious hard enough and maybe manifest into his dreams. Sometimes it worked, but other times he felt the whole thing become a nightmare to watch something so close be dangled right before him, only to be snatched away like those godforsaken cat toys that Taehyung thought were funny when he was younger. Now that he has his dream in the form of reality, right in his hands like a precious gemstone, he’s more than willing to bask in its beauty and hold it tight while he still can.

Even as the tasks you entrust to him and Jimin to take care of run on a little, the bright blue hues have long since fades in shades of scarlet and peach, with the cool air settling in and the inhabitants of the forest becoming the house’s music. You’ve worked just as hard to salvage the rest of the vials for Taehyung’s upcoming project, though there are no traces of the former soot and baby hairs sticking up haphazardly. It’s obvious that despite the backfire of some of your charms, you’re still in a jovial mood.

Truthfully, even he’s actually been enjoying the use of his newfound arms and legs. They’ve grown on him now that he’s gotten the hang of them, and from what he can see—even Jimin is enjoying his new form, tiring himself out especially with the heavy lifting. He isn’t outside with either of you, instead his light snores are being muffled by the shut door of the guest bedroom.

What a shame, he thinks to himself, Jimin would love the view.

It’s peaceful sitting out back—the trees aren’t as congested around the surrounding area, giving a front-row view of the twinkling stars. Each of them stark against their dark canvas, painting pictures of Greek myths that Taehyung (and by extension, him and Jimin) once had to study with a close eye. He couldn’t pull up any of them from memory, but he always enjoyed the fact that each of the heroes and even the deities had dreams in one way or another, whether it was to maintain their status or to fall in love, they all wanted something in this life, and it made him want more too.

He lets out a soft sigh, not quite as harsh as he’s used to, but perhaps his own fatigue has set in to tame the biting beast inside him. He’s used to becoming more lax during late hours though this is a little different.

There’s a question on the tip of his tongue he never thought he’d ever utter though. Of course, he’s only ever asked Taehyung once about the matter, the younger boy sported a knowing grin and inquired why, only making Yoongi close off further discussion. It was embarrassing, even just the thought of admitting that he’s dreamt of being human makes him shudder. If his other brunet friend knew, then it’d be endless inquiries and teasing because he’s never shown any sort of romantic interest in anything besides sleep and tuna night. Honestly, the idea of Yoongi so much as wishing to be human is a little more unlikely to Jimin admitting he always wanted to eat chocolate.

But when he sits beside you, the end of your blanket covering his right side and your own body leaned close next to his, he can’t help but feel a form of contentment. Maybe it’s his defenses lowering or maybe it’s his semi-fatigued brain coaxing him to just be okay with all of this. Either way, he holds onto these reasons, because it isn’t like he felt that at ease with you anyway. (Maybe…)

He releases a soft breath. His head turns in your direction but the words don’t fall off his lips as easily as he wishes they would.

“Something wrong, Yoongi?” you ask, slowly turning your gaze from the high heavens to him.

He wants to shake his head, but he can’t seem to do that either. He doesn’t know what it is about you, whether it’s the stupid (read: adorable) look you’re giving him or the warmth you’re spreading to him, that makes him feel this weird. Normally Taehyung and Jimin are the tongue-tied fools, but the words on the tip of his tongue refuse to budge.

The corners of your lips curl and cue flutters in his chest. He just frowns, “What?”

“Are you always this shy?”

“M-me? Shy?” He wants to laugh, even if it is true.

“Well, are you?” you ask with a raised brow.

When he makes a guttural sound that is neither a snarl or an actual sound that’s more akin to what you would consider a ‘tsk,’ you nudge him and only make the sound more louder. He can’t help it. All of his reactions are involuntarily because of you, and he can’t get a handle on why exactly (but his heart may or may not already know…).

Instead of making another sound to drive you off his tail, he just grunts a negation. “I’m just trying to…” He briefly pauses before coming up with a somewhat applicable answer, “figure out how to phrase my question.”

You don’t look particularly convinced, but he doesn’t care because 1) your smile is still in tact and 2) now he feels a little less awkward about asking such a deep, soul bearing question. Because what is humanity, really? What makes a person human? And, if he, a feline familiar, is temporarily in this human form then what can he do to truly bask in this opportunity?

The answer seems so simple to just go off by example, but when he thinks back to models that pop out the most in his mind, he has to refrain from considering any of them presentable as a role model. He’d rather not take Taehyung’s words with heavy intent for one thing, or the many characters on the streets that varied between relatively kind and downright mean. The happy medium seems to be a hard find in itself, all the semantics of humanity seem so complicated and circumstantial, he feels like his head might spin right off his neck if he so much as tried to understand it all.

So, without a second thought, he goes with the sole question that has always hung precariously off his tongue with a casual drawl: “What do I do to be more human?”

The questions catches you off guard for sure, but perhaps it’s the reminder that he wasn’t actually a human by grand design that makes your features melt back into its former amusement.

“You don’t know?” He gives you a look, earning himself a scoff in return. “Well that’s one thing you shouldn’t do.”

He tilts his head at you, “What?”

You laugh, stating quite bluntly, “Be a jerk.”

He nods slowly, making a mental note to be a little nicer. (Though the last time he was on a delivery and he crossed the street too quickly, the driver far more meaner things to say than what Yoongi just said.)

“When you’re human, you should, y’know, be more… human… show empathy,” you explain, eying him with relative sternness. It’s kind of fascinating to see what else you have to say on the matter so he continues to watch you speak. “Some people may not show it, but that’s them. Those sorts of people can be jerks, but I know you’re a cool cat somewhere underneath all that hostility so I expect a little more from you.”

As you lean your visage closer to his, he can’t help but lean back in response. His cheeks respond, an encompassing warmth biting against the cool air. “H-how would I do that?”

You just grin, tone nonchalant as ever despite how close your visage seems to be. “Listen to them when they’re speaking, help them out when you know they need it, basically try to understand them.”

He’s never really had to empathize with other people. For him, his tasks were often straightforward and to the point so it didn’t leave much room to dilly-dally. Always get from Point A to Point B in X amount of time. Plus, being with Taehyung and Jimin always left free time spent together rather than off in different areas doing whatever there was to do.

This time around his next question falls past his lips in ease—

“Well, what’s the best way to do that? Understand them, I mean.”

“Talk to them!” you laugh, watching as his expression betrays the confusion racing through his head. Of course, this doesn’t stop you from positioning yourself to face him, hints of an authoritative tone laced between the casual words: “Like… well, here—we can talk and try to understand each other.”

When he nods slowly, still watching as you say with a much softer tone, “What’s your favorite color and why?”

“Black… because I like it.” When you laugh, he frowns a little,—what’s so funny about that?—“what’s your favorite color?”

You grin in amusement, though he has to fight back his own smile when he hears your response: “Green.”

He heaves out a sigh, feeling kind of alright with the fact that he’s talking to someone other than his two goofs for best friends. “Why?”

“You’ll think this is really cheesy but it’s because green is so full of life! It’s literally everywhere and I guess I just associate it with nature so being around this much green makes me happy.”

He thinks for a moment; after all, he’s trying to understand you rather than speak about himself (which would’ve been a feat anyway because there really isn’t much to say about himself in the first place), so he choose his next few words with careful consideration, “I… see. Have you always loved nature?”

“Good job!” you exclaim, giving his leg a pat. It catches him off guard but he’s kind of mesmerized by the way you’ve just brightened up underneath the moonbeams. “And yeah, i love the atmosphere. It’s cleaner than the city and a lot emptier too. Truthfully, I’ve always been okay with being alone, so this place is literally heaven to me.”

That definitely strikes him as interesting, so he lets his own instincts take over and he says the first thing that comes to mind. “You don’t seem like it… from—um—the photos.”

“I mean I love people, just not how cities seem to hurt the earth.”

“That makes sense… I hate how cities do that too.” he says, thinking back to the many time him and Jimin shared conversations similar to this. Not many people knew how badly animals—familiars, especially—could be affected by environments so he takes the initiative to explain himself. “The kind of pollution that comes in those places makes it harder to live longer and it sets us off easily.”

There’s pensive silence that ensues as you nod, digesting the information. He doesn’t feel quite as nervous now that he’s aired out some of his feelings about things. It’s a bitter reality, but as terrible as it is, he can’t help but feel a smile creep on his features as you joke, “No wonder you’re so tense. It’s all that city air.”

He pursues his lips and just rolls his eyes. “I thought you said to be human is to be nicer.”

“Well, I’m a witch so…” Without warning, he taps your forehead with his index finger. “Hey!”

This time around Yoongi just can’t contain himself or the muscles on his face, because he cracks a smile and watches as a small pout forms on your lips. It’s really cute and it kind of squeezes his heart in a nice way, but he’s certainly not going to say a word about that no matter how comfortable he’s beginning to feel around you.

“Oh hey…” you pause, staring at him.

His lips tighten up but the smile refuses to dissipate. “What?”

“You have a nice smile.”

He blushes, looking away from you because you can’t see if it you’re not looking at his face right? Who cares if it’s nighttime. He’s not taking any chances. “S-shut up.”

Despite how cool the air was that night, Yoongi felt warmer than ever from his cheeks to his chest. Sitting beside you with mugs of tea in hand put him in ease, his heart just couldn’t seem to stop beating so damn fast but another part of him was kind of (okay, really) okay with it.

The feelings are new, but he likes that talking to you and spending time with you makes him feel more human each day. And although only a few have passed, he’s grown used to being in his human form. It’s not difficult or annoying actually. He enjoys having opposable thumbs and being able to sleep undisturbed because now he can kick perpetrators out of the area and return to his comfortable warmth. Honestly, despite not being able to jump on counters without banging up a knee or squeeze into tight spaces, he actually can live without any of those things.

The remake of the potions succeeded not too long ago, maybe a day or so, prompting Taehyung to inquire about his order. You’ve long since explained the situation, only earning laughter on the other end because apparently it’s kind of expected for you to drop a thing or two more often than not. This unleashed inquiries of when either of his familiars would return, and it’s been pretty obvious that Yoongi Isn't quite ready to go yet.

“I can go,” Jimin smiles, looking between you and the former feline. “I’ve been meaning to go back to the city. I miss Tae!”

Yoongi comments dryly, though the edges of excitement feel a little hard to contain, “Don’t you mean you miss your neighbor girlfriend?”

Rouge creeps up the brunet’s visage like vines, but he remains somewhat indignant in his response. “Pfft, psh! Being home would be nice, y’know. You just stay put, maybe find out how long this will last and I’ll probably come back for the remaining potions.”

“I can just deliver them when they’re ready?”

“Nah, I know you’ll miss me so we can travel back together.”

This earns the former canine an eye roll and a feigned look of disgust. “Bye, Min.”

“Bye, Yoongi!” he grins, hugging the older man before embracing you. “You two try not to have too much without me!”

The familiar puff of smoke has the brunet materialized away back to Taehyung.

Without Jimin, Yoongi feels a little empty. He’s grown so accustomed to his company that having gone so quickly is weird. At least until you latch a hand around his wrist and whisk him off to the kitchen with a few supplies awaiting the two of you on the counter.

“You’re making me do heavy lifting?” He meets your eyes with a raise of his brow. “Do I look like that muscle pup?”

You laugh, scrunching your nose as you drag him closer. “It’s nothing you can’t handle, you lazy cat. Look! There’s just blankets and a basket.”

“For?” He tilts his head at the load with a careful eye. “A picnic?”

“I mean wouldn’t it be nice to sit out at a nicer spot than my backyard?” You can’t contain the smile spreading across your lips. “C’mon, I promise it’ll be really nice. It’s a small hike but I figured since you’ve been such a big help and becoming a really great human that we could, y’know, celebrate that.”

Between the shine in your eyes and the pout on your lips, he can’t deny you. It’s ridiculous because when he thinks about it, nearly a full week has passed since his and Jimin’s arrival in your place. And here he is, beckoning to your whim. Your growth on him has been exponential, the kind of person you are to the things you like to do and what certain topics make you feel have just slipped between the two of you with long conversation, with his observations of you, and with this undeniable desire of his to just bask in all this time with you.

He sees why Taehyung talks highly of you. The way his friend lights up at very sound of your name or reminders of you whenever the three of them go out. The brunet has many friends. So many people know him and talk to him, but you’ve always been one of those really special friends that he holds near and dear. And for Yoongi to be able to see and hear just how witty and funny you are makes him very addicted to your atmosphere.

Your aura is unparalleled, and he actually finds it very hard to believe that you don’t have a familiar because people you and Taehyung usually do. The kind souls keep theirs, so it kind of strikes as odd that you don’t.

His thoughts and your words keep him company as the two of you reach your final stretch toward this secret spot. It makes him feel elated because you admit that no one else has seen it, and that out of everyone you’ve met and come to know (despite how short) he’s the one you want to show. His grip tightens on the items you given him, his brows raised as he begins to see the forest around you two melt into an open field, bare of any trees that could hinder the sight of the twinkling stars above.

He sees why you keep it hidden from everyone else. The place is simplistic with a touch of what feels like home to him—with several other accompanying hills offering the same vantage point as this spot, but he can tell from the tall grass and the small sleep flowers surround the area that this is yours.

He smiles at you, unabashed this time. “It’s beautiful.”

You grin, guiding toward the center where it’s most clear. “Thank you. I found it when I first moved here and I come here sometimes. I thought I’d take you since you’ve been really great, Yoongi.”

His voice gets smaller as he mutters while looking away, “Thank you.”

“No, Yoongi.” He looks up at you in confusion, “Thank you.”

—

There’s a particular stillness that falls between the two of them after the food’s been eaten and the incessant chatter becomes a dull hum among the chorus of branches rustling and the crickets chirping, even a few notes from the prowling owls. The starry night takes up both your attentions with the luminescence shedding light upon the scene.

You brought a battery-powered lantern, but you two decided to keep off until it was time to head back, if neither of you fell asleep right then and there. Truthfully, Yoongi would’ve. His ability to fall asleep anywhere and everywhere was uncanny and unparalleled compared to most, but the racing of his own thoughts keeps him wide awake beside you.

The obvious one is the scariest one—his human form. Of course, none of this is permanent, but the realization that he would no longer be this way makes his heart hurt. He wouldn’t be able to flash a sarcastic thumbs up or walk around on two legs. His daily tasks as a human would be done as a feline, and whether it was possible to do such things in that form was still up for debate. For him, losing this also meant losing out on opportunities he didn’t think he would have as a familiar. It’s even worse to consider losing his familial status, not because he enjoys it—well, of course he does—but if he wasn’t a familiar, then would Taehyung still want to see him? After all, did this happen with your familiar? Did yours up and leave you to loneliness?

He doesn’t realize how engrossed in his thought he’s been until you repeat his name, accompanied with a nudge of your shoulders this time.

Letting out a sigh, he cranes his head toward yours and turns back toward the stars when he realizes you’re staring at him. “Sorry... what’s up?”

“S’okay,” you say, a breathy laugh falling past your lips as you look back up at the stars. “Do you like being human, Yoongi?”

“Well, yeah,” he says immediately. “A lot, actually.”

“Has it been a dream of yours?”

Am I that transparent?

He blinks, raising a brow at you. “How’d you figure?”

“You asked me how to be more human. My old familiar did that when I first spilled that potion on someone.”

“That’s why you don’t have a familiar?”

You nod, “It’s not a big deal. I live here and do orders, as more of a pick-up place so I don’t really need a familiar to do things when I can do them myself.”

“I see…”

“Yeah, so how long has this been a dream for you?”

“A while,” he admits, a soft laugh parting his lips. Yet another question is on the tip of his tongue, threatening to fall off but he’s hesitating just a little time around. Whether it’s fear of the answer or just his own anxiety keeping him from asking, he doesn’t know but what does part his lips eases him just a centimeter. “Can I ask you something?”

“Yeah, of course you can,” you smile, waiting now that he’s laid a pathway for an answer he’s kind of dreading to hear.

“I know this won’t last forever… so what’s my expiration date on this whole thing?” he asks, daring to look at you. He finds that you’re back to staring, and it makes his heart thrum just a little.

“Usually a few more days, weeks at most…” you answer, grazing over his features before you continue with one more word that he feels more hope he should. “Unless…”

His voice is soft, mind still loudly screaming at the prospect of this being a forever. “Unless?”

“Well, unless you really wish to stay human.”

He opens his mouth to say something on his mind, but as he tries to conjure up the nerve he can’t seem to really think. He knows he wants to be human. He wants it so bad. Even more than tuna night at Taehyung’s, but the golden-skin boy with the boy of haphazard brunet lock becomes apparent in the back of his mind and it leaves him feeling a little bittersweet. “...I see.”

“Is everything alright?”

He tries to scoff out a laugh, but his throat wavers just a bit. “Y-yeah, why?”

“Well, I thought you’d be more excited to know you could really be human…” you admit, trying to laugh off your own small disappointment but he doesn’t miss it at all.

“I mean, of course. I just don’t want to get my hopes up y’know?” It’s a partial lie and he knows it. You probably know it too, but you don’t call him out on it.

“Oh, I understand, but I promise if it’s what you really want then you will stay human…” you try to reassure, smiling a little at him. He feels sad to think that if he stops being human, he wouldn’t be able to share another moment like this with you. “That is what you want, right?”

He sighs and admits, “I don’t know. I’d feel bad if I left Taehyung like that, but… I really want to stay human. God,” He releases a soft chuckle. “I’ve wanted it since I was a kitten, honestly. And you made that come true, so seriously thank you for giving this to me.”

“Thank you for keeping me company,” you muse, turning your body towards him. He takes that as a cue to do the same, and when you don’t pull away from his hand on top of yours, he keeps it there. The way your index fingers interlocks with his certainly doesn’t fly past his head like he pretends it does. “You’ve been really nice to have around, and it makes me a little sad to see you go, y’know.”

They stare at each other for a while—he doesn’t say a word—rather he studies your visage with an adoring intensity laid beneath the steeled dark hues. He wants to tell you that he’ll stay human, if not for himself but for you too. He doesn’t want to miss out on any more moments like this, especially when you’re not pulling away from the way his fingers completely intertwine with yours. When you open your mouth to speak, he brushes a stray hair.

“Is there something on my face?” The half-joke falls past your lips but the deep blatancy that what presses on in his head is now or never and the small details like Taehyung can wait.

The inner him wants to smack for what he says, but it flies out of his mouth anyway in the form of a mocking scoff. “God, you’re so stupid you know that right?”

“Hey!” You laugh, giving his chest a smack with your entwined hands. “And you’re mean.”

He shakes his head, cheeks burning just a tad, “I-I’m sorry. I don’t know how to express how i feel or do these sorts of things,” he holds your hands. “But.. There’s something I’d like to try with you, because it feels right and you were the one to tell me that it’s best to do those sorts of things, right?”

You nod slowly, looking at him as he gets a little closer. He doesn’t miss the way your eyes dart from his to his lips, but he’s certain you don’t miss the way his does the same exact thing to yours. “What is it?” your voice is soft, clenching his heart even tighter than before.

His nose brushes against yours, his lips hovering over yours as he asks, “Can I kiss you?” He admits, “I’m scared that if I don’t stay this way then I’ll miss this chance and I—”

“—Yes, you can,” you smile, using your arm you’ve been resting on top prop yourself upward and press your lips to his. And whatever magic feels like, that sort of calm before the storm washes over him. Like a spell, he doesn’t think of his worries or anxieties that this won’t be forever as he kisses you back. You pull back for a moment just touch the side of his face in a tentative caress, eyes searching his just to say, “I mean it, if you want to be human then you can be. Whatever else comes afterwards, it’ll work out, ‘kay?”

He nods, allowing them to sink in. “‘Kay.”

Shutting his eyes once yours do, he just lets you push him onto his back and relishing in the way you lean atop of him. Whether this bliss of humanity remains forever, he doesn’t deny that the taste on your lips of mint leaves and the fruit tart from earlier are fresh, delectable, and addictive, nor does he care if it does or doesn’t, because his dream has finally come true.

—

Eventually you two find yourselves laid atop the soft, flannel blankets, his arms wrapped around your body and your arm laid across his chest. He feels peaceful, more than he’s ever been in all twenty-four years of his existence, and it’s because of you.

“Yoongi?” you hum, tracing a pattern on his chest.

When he hums an affirmation, you tell him, “I know you’re worried about Taehyung, but I promise he’ll want you to be happy too. Plus, I can kick his butt if he’s being mean to you.”

He lets the laughter rumble out into the open air, colliding with your own and he’s reminded of the warmth from the first night you two shared together.

A thought occurs to him right then—perhaps the taste of ambrosia isn’t quite sweet or bitter, but rather split down the middle with flecks of compromise and love encompassed in between the seams. Min Yoongi has always wished to be human, to feel what two-legged creatures feel and see the world a little higher than he once did, and to finally have that, all thanks to you, is all the more better.

If anything, it’s better than any concoction made by the gods above.

#bangtan bookclub #bts writing squad #btswriters #sfwbangtan #ot7network #yoongi scenarios #min yoongi scenarios #yoongi fluff #yoongi au #bts fanfic #bts scenarios #bts fluff #bts au #emswriting

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loosejournal · 5 years

Text

Dwight Garner’s favorite quotations

For nearly four decades I’ve kept what is known as a commonplace book – a bound notebook, and later a long computer file, passed from desktops (1990s) to laptops (2000s) to my cell phone, into which I’ve poured verbal delicacies, “blasts of a trumpet”, as Emerson put it, and bits of scavenged wisdom from my life as a reader. Yea, for I am an underliner, a destroyer of books, and maybe you are, too. Commonplace books are not so uncommon. John Locke kept one, as did Virginia Woolf. W. H. Auden published his, as did the poet J. D. McClatchy. E. M. Forster’s was issued after his death. The novelist David Markson wrote terse and enveloping novels that resembled commonplace books in many regards; they were bird’s nests of facts threaded with the author’s own subtle interjections. For fans of the commonplace book genre, many prize examples have come from lesser-known figures like Geoffrey Madan and Samuel Rogers, both English, who produced books that are notably witty and illuminating. These have become cult items. Christopher Ricks noted about Rogers that, although he may not have been an especially kind man, “he was very good at hearing what was said”.

I use my own commonplace book as an aide-mémoire, a kind of external hard drive. Reading it is a way of warding off what Christopher Hitchens, quoting a friend, called CRAFT (Can’t Remember a Fucking Thing) syndrome. I use my gleanings in my own writing. Like Montaigne, I quote others “in order to better express myself”. Montaignecompared quoting well to arranging other people’s flowers. Sometimes, I sense, I quote too often, swinging on them in my writing as if from vine to vine. It’s one of the curses of spending a lifetime as a word-eater, and of retaining, so far, a semi-reliable memory.

I am no special fan of most books of quotations. Bartlett’s Familiar Quotations, the Yale Book of Quotations and the New Penguin Dictionary of Modern Quotations, to name three dependable reference books, have their uses, for sure. They are sturdy repositories of literary and verbal history. (Countless other books of quotations aren’t reliable at all.) But even the best contain a good deal of dead weight. They lean, sometimes necessarily, on canned and overused thought and, more grievously, are skewed to the upbeat. So many of the lines they contain seem to vie to be stitched on throw pillows or ladled, like chicken soup, on the credulous soul. “Almost all poetry is a failure”, Charles Bukowski contended, “because it sounds like somebody saying, Look, I have written a poem.” The same is true of quotations and aphorisms; too many have a taxidermied air, as if they were self-consciously aimed at posterity.

This small slice of the material I’ve hoarded is a sliver of a much larger book project, one that will break with the conventions of commonplace books and volumes of quotations by organizing quotes by feel rather than by category. There are few life lessons except by accident. I must add that I do not agree with everything that is said: retweet does not, as they say on Twitter, necessarily equal endorsement.

-----

(small selection)

“It’s only words, unless they’re true.” – David Mamet, Speed-the-Plow

“Why are you all reading? I don’t understand this reading business when there is so much fucking to be done.” – Sheila Heti, How Should a Person Be?

“Better a good venereal disease than a moribund peace and quiet.” – Henry Miller, Quiet Days in Clichy

“Everything that is true is inappropriate.” – Oscar Wilde

“Everyone nodded, nobody agreed..” – Ian McEwan, Amsterdam

“Let’s, as if sore, grab a few things from the flood.” – A. R. Ammons, Complete Poems

“Fragments, indeed. As if there were anything to break.” – Don Paterson, Best Thought, Worst Thought

“He licked his lips. ‘Well, if you want my opinion–’ ‘I don’t,’ she said. ‘I have my own.’ –Toni Morrison, Beloved

“Love poems must be bounced back off a moon.” – Robert Graves, Paris Review interview

“See the moon? It hates us.” – Donald Barthelme, Sixty Stories

“You know where the Beatles got that shit from. You know that’s our shit they fucking up like that.” – Albert Murray, South to a Very Old Place

“How come the Beatles never got busted for statutory rape – because they’re white?” – Eve Babitz, Eve’s Hollywood

“I hope you don’t mind, I’m from the South. We’re touchers.” – Charlie Rose, attributed

“Mick Jagger should fold up his penis and go home.” – Robert Christgau, Village Voice

“Somehow he knew, based on very little experience, that this faux-casualshit spelled money.” – Tom Wolfe, Bonfire of the Vanities

“Being rich is about acting, too, isn’t it? A style, a pose, an interpretation that you force upon the world.” – Martin Amis, Money

“If you want to know what God thinks of money, just look at the people he gave it to.” – Dorothy Parker

“Oh, fuck, not another elf.” – Hugo Dyson, as J.R.R. Tolkien read aloud an early draft of The Lord of the Rings

“I am putting a mental jigsaw together of what a hobbit looks like, based on a composite of every customer I have ever sold a copy to.” – Shaun Bythell, Diary of a Bookseller

“You put your finger in it, and go swish, swish, swish.” – Jane Jacobs, on how to make a West Village martini

“Wasn’t the whole 20th century a victory lap of collage, quotation, appropriation, from Picasso to Dada to Pop?” – Jonathan Lethem, The Ecstasy of Influence

“I suddenly began to realize that everybody in America is a natural-born thief.” – Jack Kerouac, On the Road

“The not paying for things is intoxicating.” – Philip Roth, American Pastoral

“I don’t trust anybody who hasn’t shoplifted.” – John Waters

“Cleanliness might not be next to godliness but it is certainly adjacent to horniness.” – Geoff Dyer, on hotels, in Otherwise Known as the Human Condition

“The assumptions a hotel makes about you! All those towels.” – Stanley Elkin, The Dick Gibson Show

“The meat around my skull can’t stop smiling.” – Catherine Lacey, The Answers

“Let’s have some new clichés.” – Sam Goldwyn

“I need some new attitudes, some new affirmations and denials.” – Lionel Trilling, letter

“Good-bye, and I don’t mean au revoir.” – Christopher Ricks

“Of course it’s all right for librarians to smell of drink.” – Barbara Pym, Less Than Angels

“Edward worried about his drinking. Would there be enough gin? Enough ice?” – Donald Barthelme, Flying to America

“I have no enemies. But my friends don’t like me.” – Philip Larkin

“There was obviously nothing to recommend me to anyone.” – Deborah Levy, Hot Milk

“I have always disliked myself at any given moment; the total of such moments is my life.” – Cyril Connolly, Enemies of Promise

“Talk into my bullet hole. Tell me I’m fine.” – Denis Johnson, Jesus’ Son

“Every time he played a note he waved it goodbye. Some times he didn’t even wave.” – Geoff Dyer on Chet Baker, But Beautiful

“Let us reflect whether there be any living writer whose silence we would consider a literary disaster.” – Cyril Connolly, The Unquiet Grave

“If we did get a writer worth reading, should we know him when we saw him, so choked as we are with trash?” – George Orwell, Keep the Aspidistra Flying

“Book publishing should be done by failed writers who recognize the real thing when they see it.” – Robert Giroux, Paris Review interview

“Books are, let’s face it, better than everything else.” – Nick Hornby, Ten Years in the Tub

“Revenge is the capitalism of the poor.” – Aravind Adiga, Selection Day

“It makes an immigrant laugh to hear the fears of the nationalist, scared of infection, penetration, miscegenation, when this is small fry, peanuts, compared to what the immigrant fears – dissolution, disappearance.” – Zadie Smith, White Teeth

“The face of ‘evil’ is always the face of total need.” – William S. Burroughs, preface to Naked Lunch

“In our deepest moments we say the most inadequate things.” – Edna O’Brien, The Love Object

“How desperate do you have to be to start doing push-ups to solve your problems?” – Karl Ove Knausgaard, My Struggle: Book Two

“The primary object of a student of literature is to be delighted.” – Lord David Cecil

TLS, 2018

#quotes #dwight garner #commonplace book

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rebelthroughreading-blog · 5 years

Text

Killing Mr. Griffin by Lois Duncan

High school teachers can be too demanding, especially Mr. Griffin. Fed up with him, a group of kids plan a kidnapping prank, but everything goes wrong when Mr. Griffin winds up dead.

Quick Information

price: $9.00

number of pages: 272

ISBN: 978-0316099004

publisher and date: Little, Brown Books for Young Readers; Revised edition 2010

author’s website: https://loisduncan.arquettes.com

genre: juvenile fiction, mystery

main subjects: mystery and detective stories

Plot

After another hard day with Mr. Griffin, the strictest teacher at their high school, a couple of students plan to scare their teacher into being more forgiving to their students. With Mark Kenney in the lead, they plan to kidnap and frighten Mr. Griffin, then return him to the safety of his normal life with something to make him second guess being so mean to students. However, in order to make this work, they need a few more people, so they enlist Susan, a smart but lonely girl with a huge crush on the senior class president who also agreed to be in on the prank. With all of them set with their roles, some perhaps a bit more reluctant than others, they kidnap Mr. Griffin, but their plan goes south when something happens, and when they go back to check on their teacher who should be just fine, he is dead. The kids have to figure out what to do with their prank gone awry.

Who’s reading it?

Written on a 9th grade level, ages from 12 and up may be interested in the content of the book.

Why did I read it?

In all reality, I was a middle school student scanning the shelves of my school library for my next book to read when I came across Killing Mr. Griffin, written by the same author who wrote I Know What You Did Last Summer and Gallows Hill. Though I admit that I do not remember much of the latter, the former had intrigued me enough to keep reading more of Duncan’s works. The cover of Killing Mr. Griffin at the time that I read it was not the modern one with the noose behind the large and eerie words but two feet tied up in a way only a man laying on the ground could be. The picture was in black and white, almost a sepia color, and the title had a green stripe behind it. The cover was striking, especially when considering that I found it in my middle school library. At the time, I did not read the backs of books, plots, summaries, or even first pages or chapters to determine whether or not I wanted to read a book. I just read them. If only we could be as unprejudiced as we were when we were children. However, since then, I have reread the book, not only because it made such a good impression on me when I first read it, but also because it had a story that was appealing even after so many years. A couple of kids get mad at their teacher for being so mean and grading so harshly so they decide to do what they think is a harmless prank: blind fold and tie him up, smack him around a little, and leave him in the dark and cold for a couple of hours until he breaks and then let him go. But that does not happen, and these children have to deal with the consequences of their actions.

Evaluation

This novel shows how good, honest people can be roped into doing terrible things. Susan is a straight-A student, sweet, always the good girl, and she agrees to participate in an outrageous plan because the boy on which she has a crush asks her to and her part is only doing something that she would already do. All she has to do is keep Mr. Griffin after school long enough for the rest of the students and staff to leave so that the other kids can do the kidnapping. She feels as though she is finally part of a group, has friends, and will maybe start to turn her life around to a happier and more positive way other than just doing well on tests and assignments. She does not want to go through with this plan, regrets it before, while, and after she has done it, and tries her hardest to set what they did right.

The novel also switches between several perspectives, showing the different reactions to the same situation and getting a more complete story. Though the novel mainly focuses on Susan and David, the readers have the chance to see some of the workings to the other characters so that they better understand their actions.

The story is also a cautionary tale that describes what can happen when things get out of control. This is a worst case scenario from a plan that can only have bad endings. The characters have their own motives and views on what this prank is supposed to be, and none of them quite understand the gravity of their situation until it drops on them with full force.

The Issues

Violence / Murder by Minors

Mental illness

Manipulation

Teenagers kidnap, torture, and inadvertently kill their teacher. They leave him in the cold and away from his medicine that he needs for his heart condition. Though they may not have meant to cause his death, they did mean to kidnap and scare him. Their actions were purposeful and in some cases malicious.

The leader of their group is Mark Kenney who has a personality disorder, psychopathy, where he is charismatic and fully capable of manipulating others into doing exactly what he wanted. He makes the other teenagers want to commit this crime by calling it a prank with a motive that has their best interests in mind. He tells them what they want to hear, because he knows what will make them do what he needs.

So why should we read it?

The novel shows different perspectives of the same situation. Not many novels get into the heads of characters who are not the immediate main characters of a story, and yet this one does with the purpose of allowing the readers a fuller view of not only what happened and why but how it is affecting everyone, not just those main people. The readers see the teacher and his wife for a brief moment before the attack so that they can better understand the teacher’s personality and motives as well as the wife’s when she comes back into the story later. David’s grandmother gets a section to describe her feelings about the situation, and how she misinterpreted her grandson’s actions. We see Susan, David, Mark, Betsy, and Jeff - and occasionally their parents - which shows a whole different side to the story that the audience may never have considered had the story been left to only be in one point of view.

How can we use it?

All of these extra points of view help readers relate to what is happening. They need to see how actions affect everyone, not just them or those immediately around them. They need to see that doing something that they may not see as a big deal can become a big deal. This book does a great job at showing how skewed perceptions can be, especially by those of young adults who are still at an impressionable age. They are learning to understand when they are being manipulated, when they are wrong, when they are right, and when they should trust themselves and people who are trustworthy. They also need to learn that sometimes they cannot do anything to stop what has already happened. These children were manipulated by someone who fed them lies of comfort and reassurances to keep them going, but they could not have known the extent of what they were doing. Do we excuse their behavior? No. They still participated in the kidnapping of their teacher which led to his eventual death, but they were coerced and heavily guided by a strong force. Sometimes people are led astray, and they have to figure out how to fix the wrongs before they become worse.

Booktalk Ideas

Mark successfully manipulates several other teenagers into doing exactly what he wants. He talks them into believing that this is what Mr. Griffin needs and deserves. He justifies the actions, tells them plans for if something goes wrong, and makes them believe that he will take care of any issues. How is he able to do all of this so well, even with people he barely knows? Is it his psychopathy that allows him to understand and read other people so well?

Susan does not fit in with the crowd. She is a smart girl who keeps to herself and does not do anything that could be considered wrong or rebellious. The only reason she agrees to the plan is because David asks her and she has a crush on him. However, she is hesitant to say yes even then. Can extreme feelings such as having a crush makes someone’s judgement that blurred? Why is she so easily swayed?

What else can I read?

We All Fall Down by Robert Cormier

I Know What You Did Last Summer by Lois Duncan

Athletic Shorts by Chris Crutcher

Awards and Lists

ALA Best Book for Young Adults--l976

Massachusetts Children's Book Award--l982

Alabama Young Readers Choice Award--l982-83 86-87

Nominated for California Young Readers Award--l982

Selected for Librarians Best Book List, England--l986

New York Times "Best Book for Children"--l988

NBC Movie of the Week -- 1997

Nominated for Edgar Allan Poe Award

Professional Review

Teri S. Lesesne, G. Kylene Beers, and Lois Buckman (1996), Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy - https://www-jstor-org.libaccess.sjlibrary.org/stable/40013439?seq=2#metadata_info_tab_contents

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