Flight: A Novel by Sherman Alexie
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Book Reviews of Flight: A Novel
Book Review: A mesmerizing voice
Summary: 5 Stars
First Line: Call me Zits.
I first became a fan of Sherman Alexie when I watched the film Smoke Signals. The fandom intensified when I read Indian Killer. Now that I've read Flight, I may just graduate to waving his books in the faces of everyone I meet, exclaiming, "You gotta read these!" Alexie is a powerful, imaginative writer with a talent for making readers see other people, other cultures, in a whole new--and very real-- way.
Everyone in Flight calls the main character "Zits", and if you wonder how Zits thinks of himself, he'll tell you:
"I'm a blank sky, a human solar eclipse."
Zits is half Indian, half Irish. His alcoholic father took off when he was born. His mother died when he was six. His aunt kicked him out when he was ten after he set her boyfriend on fire. (Don't feel too bad for the boyfriend; he was a pedophile.) Now he's fifteen. He's been in twenty foster homes and twenty-two schools. He has barely enough clothes to fit in a backpack. He's a throwaway kid, and he wants revenge, so one day he takes a gun and walks into a bank...and begins a series of adventures in time travel. No time machine for Zits; the gun is the catalyst for his stints as a mute Indian boy during the Battle of the Little Big Horn, an FBI agent, an Indian tracker, an airplane pilot instructor, and his own father. His desire for revenge rapidly becomes an ongoing lesson in empathy.
The book had barely begun when I fell for Zits hook, line and sinker. What did he say? Something that every passionate reader will understand:
"I bet you a million dollars there are less than five books in this whole house. What kind of life can you have in a house without books?"
Alexie's skilled pen makes Zits anything but a throwaway kid in the reader's mind. I empathized with this lonely young boy, my heart broke when his broke, I became angry when he did. As Zits time-traveled, his attitude began to change, and I found myself hoping with all my heart that he no longer thought of himself as worthless; that someone somewhere would see how valuable he was.
What better thing can you say about a writer than that you were totally involved in what happened to his fictional character? That, for a short period of time, you were transported miles away from your comfort zone and confronted with people totally alien to you, and that you began to care, to get angry, and to be compelled to do something?
Book Review: A typical boy in an untypical world...
Summary: 5 Stars
This is how Alexie brings us in! He introduces us to a character that we are already familiar with no matter how old we are - the typical troubled, "bad boy" teen. Through the first few chapters, we begin with an, "Ah, I know this boy" attitude. Then, his "typical" bad boy life changes. He goes places none of us have before. But, we still want to follow him because we "know" him, or at least someone like him. On the surface, the entire novel seems like a young teenage boy and his unexpected journeys through time. However, we can look so much deeper than that. It seems, through his time travel, Zits is making commentary on real world and societal issues and is not afraid to say it. In the beggining, he uses the teenage language and laid back "I don't care" attitude to introduce concepts of murder, culture, citizenship, identity, friendship, etc. We may almost pass him off as a troubled teen with an attitude problem. However, his extreme detail and analysis of his time travel proves to us that in every time and place in the world there are major contradictions between what we are told/taught and what actually happens and how people actually feel.
Although I thoroughly enjoyed this book, I do feel that adolescents might have trouble with it. As a college student reading it for school, I had trouble stopping to jot down notes or putting the book down. In the begining, when I would leave the book, I felt like I had no idea what was going on. I could make new predictions every other chapter as to if this person really was Zits, if it was a dream, time travels, a nightmare, etc. and sometimes my predictions were way off. Just when I thought I knew what was happening I realized I didn't. Although predicting and repredicting was fun for me, I think it may cause the "anti-reading" adolescent student trouble. I enjoy being confused and I enjoy every twist and turn, but I'm not sure a majority of adolescents would. However, because of the literary beauty, terrific writing, great story and underlying commentary, I believe trying to get adolescents to read this novel is definitely worth a shot!
Book Review: Good Job Alexie!
Summary: 5 Stars
Flight is a novel that was assigned in one of my English courses, and I wasn't sure just what to expect. From the opening lines, however, I knew that I wouldn't be putting the book down until I finished reading it.
It is quite easy to see that, above all, Alexie is having fun. Some might think this doesn't amount to much, but the truth is it goes a long way -especially for a reader like me. He's not afraid to push the envelope, nor is he afraid to tackle any subject.
As a future English teacher, there's one issue that comes readily to mind. On the subject of obscenities, Zits (the main character) wonders aloud why people are so offended by a certain grouping of words. I have wondered this as well, from time to time, and it is a major issue when it comes to teaching a novel, not just reading it.
Alexie does a great job of creating a character that a reader (of any age) can easily relate to. Zits' experiences aren't much different from those of any teenager growing up. Sure, not every teenager is an orphan bouncing around from foster home to foster home, but most teenagers experience stress, angst, and confidence issues. Throughout all, however, Zits is a character that readers can cheer for. We can sometimes speak from experience on what is going on in his life and what his outlook is, and sometimes we can only be sympathetic for a person going through what we have never known. Ultimately, however, he is a character that we can identify with.
As for historical inaccuracies, one dominant question that should be in every reader's mind when reading a first-person narrative is "how trustworthy is this character telling the story?" Zits sets himself up as a history buff. But if that's truly the case, how can he be so far off the mark with his depictions of those historical figures and battles, which he knows/idealizes?
Whatever the truth of Little Big Horn and Crazy Horse, I didn't find that it interfered with the novel at all. I found myself drawn to the character and his trials more than history.
Book Review: Indian Killer Gone-A-Time Travelling
Summary: 5 Stars
Flight is wunderkind Sherman Alexie's newest novel after a loooong ten-year pause. It is also his first youth and science-fiction novel.
The wait was well-waitered. His newest character is angsty, time-travelling Seattle Indian teen, Zits. With his aesthetically applied moniker, Zits shows externally what seems to be an emptiness internally: sharp, red pustules of rage. After shooting up a bank lobby on the encouragement and companionship of pale complexioned, Nietzsche-quoting fellow teen inmate, Justice, Zits disappears into a time rift, body-hopping the continental United States' space and history, pondering the whys and wherefores and what-to-from here's of his new pal "Justice."
With a nod to the late, great Vonnegut in the title-page quote and post-publication interviews, Alexie acknowledges his indebtedness to his literary predecessors. He also, as always, draws heavily from his contemporary Indian culture in much the way his past works did: through Indian lore (ghost dancing is again referenced, this time prior to shooting up the bank lobby) and through Indian rhythm. And perhaps this is the way Alexie most stands out as a writer: his prosody is deeply reminiscent of oral traditions and the much later Beat Generation we saw in the 1960's and 1970's. Hearing Alexie talk his art is a must.
As YA fiction, Flight succeeds on all levels. It is not the heady, intellectual pudding of yester-years, instead it is a proud and pithy piece, appealing to those of the younger generation simply for the rash action, searing self-hate and contradictory arrogance of Zits. The entire premise of this book is a caution to step back, and a roaring laugh verging on tears at Zits' self-mocking impotence, exactly the type of thing every red-blooded teen is dealing with today.
Flight is great, however you can be assured that this is not going to be Sherman Alexie's best novel. We will see better and hopefully many, many more.
Book Review: An Important and Worthwhile Book
Summary: 5 Stars
One of the biggest problems in the middle and high school English classroom is that students don't feel connected to the characters in most of the texts they read. This is definitely not the case with "Flight." The protagonist, "Zits," is young, confused, headstrong, bi-racial, physically unattractive, a social outcast, and almost jarringly candid. He is a narrator that adolescents will be drawn to because of his imperfections. It's a good thing, too, because Sherman Alexie has written a novel that, while it may seem crude and simple because of the language, is anything but. As Zits travels through time on a quest for identity and understanding of his world, Alexie raises questions such as: What makes a hero? What is racism/hate/love? What is family? What is revenge and how much power does it have over us? What makes us "us"? These are important questions for everyone in our society, so it only makes sense that students should be exposed to them now.
Many reviewers, myself included, were a little shocked at first by the language and graphic depictions. Surely this isn't a novel I would consider teaching as an untenured teacher, but I would love to bring it into the classroom one day. Alexie's language is actually my favorite aspect of the book. Yes, there is a lot of cursing, but there is a frankness of speech and simplicity of language that give Zits a strong voice and a resounding one. He may speak in short sentences, but when he says, "I think about the people I betrayed. I think about the people who have betrayed me. We're all the same people. And we are all falling," (130) there's nothing trivial about it.
Overall, I think this is a very enjoyable, thought-provoking, honest, and (sometimes uncomfortably) important novel. Teaching it is a personal choice and may not be an option for you, but I highly recommend reading it as the themes are relatable to everyone.