Five Reasons Why We Should Worship David Levithan

1. He can create characters you will root for desperately.

I've read quite a few books in my time that presume that you, as the reader, will root for the characters they contain. You know what I mean - those lazy narratives that have a lot of pluck but don't quite hit the mark in terms of showing you why you want this protagonist to succeed. David Levithan does not presume. His characters are so real, so imperfect that you believe in them completely, and want nothing more for them to be happy.

2. He tackles vast issues without once condescending to his audience or alienating anyone or simplifying the vastness or complications of those issues.

By which I mean you are not likely to put his books down.

3. He is uncompromisingly optimistic.

It would be very easy to see nothing but darkness in the world of his characters, but Levithan's stories always look for light.
I've just finished his first novel, Boy Meets Boy in which it is quite normal for the High School's best quarterback to be a magnificent drag queen by the name of Infinite Darlene. Some reviewers have called the world of Boy Meets Boy to be a fantasy for these reasons, but I'm convinced Levithan is just looking to a not-so-distant future.

4. His prose is beautiful.

"I want to give her a good day. Just one good day. I have wandered for so long without any sense of purpose and now this ephemeral purpose has been given to me - it feels like it has been given to me. I only have a day to give - so why can't it be a good one? Why can't it be a shared one? Why can't I take the music of the moment and see how long it can last? The rules are erasable. I can take this. I can give this.
When the song is over, she rolls down her window and trails her hand in the air, introducing a new music into the car. I roll down all the other windows and drive faster, so the wind takes over, blows our hair all around, makes it seem like the car has disappeared and we are the velocity, we are the speed. Then another good song comes on and I enclose us again, this time taking her hand."

(From Every Day, Chapter 1, page 13)

5. He is very wise.

No, seriously. I feel like I was learning several great life lessons in each of his books and finding new ways to look at the world and the people in it.


Convinced? Oh good, I'm glad I've converted you. Now go and buy everything he's every written:

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At the End of the World, the Ocean

I’ve been thinking about the ocean.

Not just because I’m at home in Vancouver now, though that’s definitely a part of it: I felt the pull of the ocean the other day, so I took the long way home on my bicycle. I wanted to hug the water as long as possible.  I needed to be close to it.  I felt the same thing again today – that yearning to be close to the sea.  I took the bus to Wreck Beach and danced in the sand and put my toes in the water.  It was cold, but it reminded me I was alive. 

I know I’m not the only person who feels this – my friend and fellow Chronicles of Word contributor Josh Martin and I were g-chatting about that feeling of being pulled to the sea.  Like the sea is truer compass for us than North.

But there’s another reason I’ve been thinking about the ocean.

Some of the most common writing advice (and by the way, it’s common, because it’s good) is that you should read a lot of books like the one you want to write.  So I’ve been devouring post-Apocalyptic books (especially, but not exclusively, YA) for the past year and a bit.  One thing that comes up over and over in these books about what happens after the end of the world is the ocean.  And when they talk about the ocean, it’s got a mythological, supernatural quality to it.  It’s much more than a place of natural beauty.

A Strange Moment

In which I had a dream last night featuring an Indian girl called Nashira who, in addition to being powerful in some way, kept goats.
I figured she wanted to be put into this story I started a couple of weeks ago, but I was particularly interested in her name and where it came from - was it Nashira or Nasheera? It sounded Hindi, but when I checked out babynamesworld.com nothing came back. Then I typed "Nashira" into google, hit the first link and here's what came back:

Gamma Capricorni (γ Cap, γ Capricorni) is a giant star in the constellation Capricornus. It has the traditional name Nashira, which comes from the Arabic سعد ناشرة - sa'd nashirah for "the lucky one" or "bearer of good news".

I swear I have never seen this page in my life.

Am now somewhat freaked out and marvelling the divinous and mysterious ways of characters and how they occasionally invade your sleep to get noticed.