Dream Boy
by Jim Grimsley

For the A-Z reading challenge.

English
195 pages
Simon & Schuster
ISBN: 0-684-82992-4

First line: On Sunday in the new church, Preacher John Roberts tells about the disciple Jesus loved whose name was also John, how at the Last Supper John lay his head tenderly on Jesus’s breast.

Back cover blurb: n/a

Thoughts: I really hate when there’s no back cover blurb on a book, because that means I have to try to sum it up in my own words and I cannot tell you enough how much I really suck at that. But here goes:

Dream Boy is the story of Nathan, a teen who’s just moved with his parents to a new town in rural USA (where is not exactly clear. Or it might be, but I am too ignorant of small town American geography to get it. ETA: North Carolina, apparently). Nathan and his parents live in a farm house on a farm owned by another family. Tony, who is the farmer’s son, really appeals to Nathan and apparently Nathan really appeals to Tony as well, as they strike up a sort of relationship, which is very, very much “don’t show, don’t tell” and Tony especially feels guilty about some of the things they do, and will avoid Nathan for periods of time when it gets too much for him. In the background of the story is Nathan’s struggle to keep certain memories under lock and key, because they are too painful to dwell on. As the story progresses, he finds these memories harder to keep from coming to the surface, as his dad is starting to pay more attention to him again.

See? I’m absolutely crap at it!

Either way, this book was absolutely terrible. Not that it wasn’t good, because it was, but in that I haven’t felt so physically ill from a book in a loooong time. The ending is very, very ambiguous and left me wondering if Nathan was or wasn’t (what, I won’t say, as that would be too much of a spoiler). I’m guessing he probably was, but I couldn’t tell for sure.

My copy of this book is a used one and on the front cover is written “This book belongs to is Aleeia Summers age 10”, but were it up to me, I would not in a million years have let this ten-year-old read this book. I’m not usually very restrictive like that, but this book has themes of sexual molestation and there is a very brutal and fairly graphic rape at one point in the story, and I just don’t think that’s for a ten-year-old to read! It made me utterly, utterly uncomfortable and sickened, and the thought of someone so young reading that… ::shudders::

On to the rating, then! It was a good book, fairly easy and quick to read, even though certain themes made me absolutely sick to my stomach. There were lighter bits in it as well, but the overall feel of the book was a rather depressing one. Possibly it was a happy ending, but it was quite confusing, so it might not have been. I’m giving the book a B, because I think it really deserves it. I know at least one person I will more or less force to read this (if he hasn’t already, that is), because I want someone else’s take on it as well.