[In a
development that I’m sure will shock precisely no one, my 13 (!!!) and
about-to-be 12 year-old sons
are both huge readers. They are fans of many
authors and books, but for this week’s series I wanted to focus on, well,
series—Young Adult series in particular—that they love. Please share your YA
recommendations, series or otherwise, for a crowd-sourced weekend post!]
On the difficult
task of appealing to kid and adult audiences, and a series that pulls it off in
(Sam) spades.
Having become
something of an expert in children’s and YA adult media and culture over the
last, I dunno, baker’s dozen or so years, I would argue that there is a very
distinct spectrum when it comes to whether and how a particular work appeals to
kid and/or adult audiences. If a work appeals only or even mostly to kids, it
can be pretty painful for the adult who is often experiencing it along with
them (I’m looking at you, Captain
Underpants). If it appeals too fully to adults, then kid audiences will be
either bored or confused and it seems kind of selfish for an adult to make them
experience it with him or her (I’m looking at you, SpongeBob SquarePants).
But when a work manages to appeal to both audiences equally and successfully,
it becomes one of those truly engaging cultural texts that, I dunno, single
fathers and their two tween sons can experience again and again with great
pleasure (I’m delightedly looking at you, the first Wreck-It Ralph
[the less said about the recent sequel, the better]).
Among the YA
series that the boys have enjoyed over the last couple years, I would say that Stephan Pastis’ Timmy Failure books are
perhaps the best at hitting that sweet spot. From 2013’s Mistakes
Were Made through last year’s 7th and apparently final It’s
the End When I Say It’s the End, the series has chronicled the hilarious
and heart-warming misadventures of Timmy Failure, our narrator, a middle
schooler, and the self-proclaimed (and only
self-proclaimed) World’s Greatest Detective. I’m not sure any books have made
my sons laugh as consistently as has Timmy; when a new book comes out we often
go to Barnes & Noble so the boys can each read their own copy immediately
before we purchase one for our collection, and watching the two of them laugh
their way through a new Timmy Failure has been one of my great parenting joys
of the last couple years. Although he would likely never admit it, Timmy also
has a very big heart, and Pastis finds a way to weave those heartfelt moments
and lessons through the books without losing a bit of Timmy’s delightfully
un-self-aware arrogance and silliness. These are truly unique and successful
tween reads, and I would unreservedly recommend them to any tweens and their
parents.
But not only
them—for the last few books in the series, after that B&N ritual this
AmericanStudier has taken his own turn to read the new Timmy Failure as well. All
those aforementioned qualifies are certainly part of it, as this is not the
kind of humor that can rub an adult reader the wrong way (I’m still looking at
you, Captain Underpants). But what really sets Timmy apart is its impressively
accurate deconstruction of the hard-boiled
private detective mystery genre. Timmy himself is clearly a connoisseur of
the genre, and so his voice and persona are carefully constructed attempts to
fashion himself into that hard-boiled prototype. But as he does so, Pastis is
able to gently satirize two different sides to the type: the irony that these
uber-detectives are often pretty clueless, especially about other characters
and relationships; and the more moving irony that their hard-boiled exteriors
often mask traumatic histories that they’re attempting to repress or forget (in
Timmy’s case, his father’s abandonment of the family). For this lifelong
MysteryStudier, these elements make the Timmy Failure books truly engaging and
thought-provoking, one more way in which they hit that rare sweet spot of kid
and adult audience appeals.
Last series
tomorrow,
Ben
PS. Thoughts on
this post? Other YA lit series, books, or authors you’d highlight?
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