#1 Printz Winner or Honor Book

King, A.S. Please Ignore Vera Dietz. New York: Alfred A Knopf, 2010.

Vera Dietz just wants to survive her adolescence without anyone noticing. But facing the tragic death of her best friend Charlie leaves Vera searching for answers about life. Why did her mom leave? Why won't her dad just trust her? Why did Charlie stab her in the back? Will he ever stop haunting her?

Justification for Nomination:

From the very first moment King pulls you in. Not into the story like a good plot so often does, but into the characters. "I am the pickle on Vera's Big Mac," a brief thought from Charlie, Vera's dead best friend, immediately entices the reader with pop culture reference. From there, we are introduced to the inner thoughts of Vera Dietz, an eighteen year old senior in high school. Vera is a loner, who wishes nothing more than to remain invisible until adulthood.

Surprisingly, King constructs her novel by using the characters' thoughts with very little actual dialogue. As readers, teens will relate first hand with these thoughts because they question everything! They express emotion that teenagers often feel but seldom express. Throughout the novel Vera makes a multitude of choices, some good and some bad. The authenticity of the character comes from witnessing the processes behind which she makes each choice.

While Vera's parents play a crucial role in Vera's identity and her father is prominent in her life, King does a good job of separating Vera's choices from parental influence. Vera doesn't have to hate her parents or think poorly of them to make her own choices. Better yet, Vera succeeds in showing her father that she has matured while acknowledging him as a positive influence in her life, despite his own mistakes.

King's plot construction is superb, letting the readers know that Charlie is dead, and that Vera keeps a terrible secret about the truth of that fateful night. But that secret isn't revealed until the end of the novel, when Vera comes to a realization about her own identity and responsibility to society. King cleverly keeps us reading to learn the secret, all the while guiding us along with Vera's journey of self discovery. In addition to the "teaser," King uses flashbacks and brief interjections from the thoughts of post-mortem Charlie, Vera's father, and the Pagoda, an old yet beautiful abandoned building. These separate voices provide alternative perspectives on Vera's life. Charlie, in death, has become fully self-aware and omniscient. Vera's father addresses issues that parents struggle with in respect to teenage issues, and the Pagoda speaks as an outsider, looking upon society from a distance. The flashbacks not only contribute to the complexity of the plot, but relate different moments of Vera's present mental state to specific defining moments in her past.

One last quality to note is the high readability of this novel, which will greatly appeal to teens. The "chapters" are short, less than 5 pages, which allows the reader to pick it up for short periods of time. Because of this broken structure, it is easy to come back to without having to re-read pages. Teenagers are often pressed for time, rushing from class to class, trying to juggle friends, homework, and other responsibilities. This book can be read in 10 minute pieces, while waiting for the bus, between classes, and even during commercial breaks.

Not only would I recommend this book be nominated for literary honor, but I would also recommend this book for any parent struggling with a teenager. Often times Vera's father thought she was behaving badly, when in fact she was making good choices, while other times he expressed pride in her, when she was only saying what she knew he wanted to hear. I think parents could benefit from this kind of insight, to see that things are not always what they seem when dealing with an adolescent.