Crazy Vanilla - Hardcover

Wersba, Barbara

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0060263687 ISBN 13: 9780060263683

Publisher: Harpercollins Childrens Books, 1986

Synopsis

A sensitive, lonely fourteen-year-old boy and a strong, uniquely individual fifteen-year-old girl become friends unexpectedly when they discover they share both a love of animals and the ambition to become wildlife photographers.

About this title

From School Library Journal:

Grade 7-9 Tyler, the friendless son of ineffectual, battling parents, lives a depressing life: his wealthy father ignores him, his mother is an alcoholic, his brother upsets him by announcing that he's gay, and no one understands his passion for wildlife photography. Even more depressing is Wersba's storytelling. In the first chapter, Tyler says that this story is all about a girl named Mitzi, but Mitzi doesn't even appear until almost halfway through the book, and the anticipation is not rewarded. Throughout, Tyler's narrative states thingswhat has happened, what will happen, what is important ("There are a few things I haven't mentioned yet," "This chapter is where Mitzi Gerrard enters the story")and little is revealed or implied through character action. Tyler is a very immature 14 year old, Mitzi is an unbelievably worldly-wise 15 year old, the resolution comes too quickly and not very credibly, and some of the dialogue belongs in a melodrama (before Tyler gives Mitzi a quick kiss on the cheek, he says, "I guess we were trying to live a lifetime in three weeks, Mitzi and I"). Tyler realizes that he, his brother, and his parents will never connect; neither will readers. David Gale, "School Library Journal"
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Publishers Weekly:

As in Tunes for a Small Harmonica and The Carnival in My Mind, Wersba writes of an eccentric upper-class family in a state of decline. Tyler Woodruff relates the events that enable him to break away from depressing surroundingshis rigid, emotionless father, his alcoholic motherand his inability to accept his brother's homosexuality. Mitzi Gerrard, whose mother is a freewheeling leftover from the '60s, shares Tyler's love for wildlife photography; she challenges Tyler's ways of thinking. When she moves away, Tyler understandably grieves, but he now can face his father, make amends with his brother and introduce his mother to AA. Mitzi and Tyler never really seem made for one another and their quirky, never-physical love for one another isn't quite believable. Still, Wersba shows, in conversations and actions, the inner workings of the hearts and minds of very contemporary teenagers.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Harpercollins Childrens Books
• Publication date: 1986
• ISBN 10: 0060263687
• ISBN 13: 9780060263683
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 184