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Summary
Summary
BONUS FEATURE: Afterword read by the author
A Harlem drugstore owner was shot and killed in his store, and the word is that 16-year-old Steve Harmon served as the lookout. Was he involved or was he simply in the wrong place at the wrong time? An amateur filmmaker, Steve transcribes his trial into a movie script, showing scene by scene how his life was turned around in an instant.
FADE IN: INTERIOR: Early morning in CELL BLOCK D, MANHATTAN DETENTION CENTER.
Steve (Voice-Over): Sometimes I feel like I have walked into the middle of a movie. Maybe I can make my own movie. The film will be the story of my life. No, not my life, but of this experience. I'll call it what the lady prosecutor called me... Monster .
FADE IN: INTERIOR COURT. A guard sits at a desk behind STEVE. KATHY O'BRIEN, STEVE's lawyer, is all business as she talks to STEVE.
O'BRIEN
Let me make sure you understand what's going on. Both you and this King character are on trial for felony murder. Felony murder is as serious as it gets....When you're in court, you sit there and pay attention. You let the jury know that you think the case is as serious as they do....
STEVE
You think we're going to win?
O'BRIEN (seriously)
It probably depends on what you mean by "win."
"The production is recorded as a full-cast dramatization, and it's difficult to imagine how it might have been accomplished more effectively. A superb recording of an intriguing work."-- AudioFile Earphones Award Winner
Coretta Scott King: Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement
Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Literature for Young Adults
National Book Award finalist
Coretta Scott King Author Honor Book
Edgar Allan Poe Award nominee, Best Young Adult
Boston Globe-Horn Book Honor Book
Author Notes
Walter Dean Myers was born on August 12, 1937 in Martinsberg, West Virginia. When he was three years old, his mother died and his father sent him to live with Herbert and Florence Dean in Harlem, New York. He began writing stories while in his teens. He dropped out of high school and enlisted in the Army at the age of 17. After completing his army service, he took a construction job and continued to write.
He entered and won a 1969 contest sponsored by the Council on Interracial Books for Children, which led to the publication of his first book, Where Does the Day Go? During his lifetime, he wrote more than 100 fiction and nonfiction books for children and young adults. His works include Fallen Angels, Bad Boy, Darius and Twig, Scorpions, Lockdown, Sunrise Over Fallujah, Invasion, Juba!, and On a Clear Day. He also collaborated with his son Christopher, an artist, on a number of picture books for young readers including We Are America: A Tribute from the Heart and Harlem, which received a Caldecott Honor Award, as well as the teen novel Autobiography of My Dead Brother.
He was the winner of the first-ever Michael L. Printz Award for Monster, the first recipient of the Coretta Scott King-Virginia Hamilton Award for Lifetime Achievement, and a recipient of the Margaret A. Edwards Award for lifetime achievement in writing for young adults. He also won the Coretta Scott King Award for African American authors five times. He died on July 1, 2014, following a brief illness, at the age of 76.
(Bowker Author Biography)
Reviews (4)
School Library Journal Review
Gr 7-12-Walter Dean Myers' novel (HarperCollins, 1999) is brought to life by a full cast of actors in this excellent audio interpretation. The author opens this audiobook by discussing many of his interviews with young prison inmates and his desire to discover what drives them to a life of crime, what makes them become monsters in society. From the outset, listeners are caught up in Steve Harmon's life as he documents the events for the film script he is writing for his high school video club. Was Steve actually the lookout in a robbery gone awry in which a man was murdered, or was he simply at the wrong place at the wrong time? The suspense and tension remain high until the end when we are told whether the jury will find Steve guilty or innocent of the crime for which he is on trial. This auditory delight is presented in the clear, well-enunciated and articulated voices of a full cast of actors. The narrator, with his deep melodious voice, reads Steve's film directions and provides the quick scene shifts, guiding listeners through the story. His voice combined with the voices of the other actors, the strong plot, and the unusual story format grabs readers and holds their interest throughout. This interpretation could entice reluctant readers to become Myers' fans. Monster is a must purchase for all middle and high school libraries. English teachers should be encouraged to use this audiobook as a possible writing prompt or as an introduction to readers' theater.-Lynda N. Short, Paul Laurence Dunbar High School, Lexington, KY (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Horn Book Review
Arrested and charged with murder, sixteen-year-old Steve Harmon is writing a screenplay of his ordeal. Balancing courtroom drama and a sordid jailhouse setting with flashbacks to the crime, Myers adeptly allows each character to speak for him or herself, leaving readers to judge for themselves the truthfulness of the defendants, witnesses, lawyers, and, most compellingly, Steve himself. Horn Rating: Outstanding, noteworthy in style, content, and/or illustration. Reviewed by: rs, Genre: for Older Fiction. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
Kirkus Review
In a riveting novel from Myers (At Her Majesty's Request, 1999, etc.), a teenager who dreams of being a filmmaker writes the story of his trial for felony murder in the form of a movie script, with journal entries after each day's action. Steve is accused of being an accomplice in the robbery and murder of a drug store owner. As he goes through his trial, returning each night to a prison where most nights he can hear other inmates being beaten and raped, he reviews the events leading to this point in his life. Although Steve is eventually acquitted, Myers leaves it up to readers to decide for themselves on his protagonist's guilt or innocence. The format of this taut and moving drama forcefully regulates the pacing; breathless, edge-of-the-seat courtroom scenes written entirely in dialogue altemate with thoughtful, introspective joumal entries that offer a sense of Steve's terror and confusion, and that deftly demonstrate Myers's point: the road from innocence to trouble is comprised of small, almost invisible steps, each involving an experience in which a ""positive moral decision"" was not made. Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Booklist Review
Gr. 9-12. Myers combines an innovative format, complex moral issues, and an intriguingly sympathetic but flawed protagonist in this cautionary tale of a 16-year-old on trial for felony murder. Steve Harmon is accused of acting as lookout for a robbery that left a victim dead; if convicted, Steve could serve 25 years to life. Although it is clear that Steve did participate in the robbery, his level of involvement is questionable, leaving protagonist and reader to grapple with the question of his guilt. An amateur filmmaker, Steve tells his story in a combination of film script and journal. The "handwritten" font of the journal entries effectively uses boldface and different sizes of type to emphasize particular passages. The film script contains minimal jargon, explaining camera angles (CU, POV, etc.) when each term first appears. Myers' son Christopher provides the black-and-white photos, often cropped and digitally altered, that complement the text. Script and journal together create a fascinating portrait of a terrified young man wrestling with his conscience. The tense drama of the courtroom scenes will enthrall readers, but it is the thorny moral questions raised in Steve's journal that will endure in readers' memories. Although descriptions of the robbery and prison life are realistic and not overly graphic, the subject matter is more appropriate for high-school-age than younger readers. (Reviewed May 1, 1999)0060280778Debbie Carton