by Francisco X. Stork
Marcelo Sandoval does not live in the “real world.” Instead, he lives in his own world. When I say this, I mean that his mental condition is Asperger’s syndrome-like. He hears his own “internal music,” and he attends a special school, Paterson.
His father, Arturo, has never truly accepted his son’s differences. He wants Marcelo to live and succeed in the real world. The first step, Arturo thinks, will be to give Marcelo a summer job at his law firm. The next step will be to enroll Marcelo in a public school for his senior year. Of course, Marcelo is opposed to both ideas. But Marcelo has no choice.
What follows is Marcelo’s true entrance into the real world. At his mailroom job, he makes a friend, Jasmine, and an enemy, Wendell. More importantly, he momentarily experiences true emotion, a totally new thing for him.
At first, I was not thrilled with this novel. Marcelo refers to his parents by their first names, which doesn’t really seem appropriate for a 17-year-old with a childlike mentality. He also refers to himself and others in the third person, which is also quite strange. But somewhere along the line, the plot becomes quite interesting, and Marcelo becomes quite engaging.
12/8/09
No comments:
Post a Comment