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Scheduled to speak at the Vonnegut Library today, Ockler chats with NUVO about what it was like having her debut novel banned by a school board in Missouri. Ockler will. I ever thought I'd experience. I blogged about this. As a young writer, what. Sign Up. Log In. Purchase a Subscription. We hope that you continue to enjoy our free content. We hope that you enjoy our free content. Since you viewed this item previously you can read it again.
Edit Close. Search this site Search News Nirvana. Toggle navigation Menu Toggle navigation. Sign Up Log In. That's my choice. And I'll never be ashamed of my choice to write about real issues. Writing on her blog , Ockler was adamant that "not every teen who has sex or experiments with drinking feels remorseful about it.
Not every teen who has sex gets pregnant, gets someone pregnant, or contracts an STD. Not every teen who has sex does so while in a serious relationship.
Not every teen who has sex outside of a relationship feels guilty, shameful, or regretful later on. The "crazy train", she added, "has finally derailed" following the Missouri ban.
I get that my book isn't appropriate for all teens, and that some parents are opposed to the content. This can be seen as very threatening in that we often feel the need to assert control over young female sexuality, because it can lead very dark places. These adolescents grew up with sexually liberated women on the TV and in movies. Anna and Frankie are in a post Sex and the City world where women are shown and sometimes even encouraged to be shallowly physical when it comes to sex. And they are definitely far beyond the concept of virginity being something to be preserved until their wedding night with a life-long sex partner.
Often there is a need to put an end date on grief, maybe out of a hopeful impulse that with enough time one will just wake up and everything will be the same again. Anna often comments in the book how good they are at pretending to be normal, with the parents turning a blind eye to the girls sneaking out to meet boys.
She wants her parents to discipline her and be angry with her as an acknowledgement she is out of control. Indeed often in the novel Anna and Frankie are failed by the adults around them. Anna shows plenty of signs of bereavement over the course of the novel, from her bargaining to her rage at Matt for leaving her with the secret of their romance. Anna copes through writing in her journal to Matt, a pretty common coping mechanism, especially among those who enjoy reading and writing.
It is the only place she can voice her complicated feelings. After all her coping takes the form of taking care of Frankie and honor roll grades by throwing herself into her school work. Relatively healthy compared to boys, failing to go to class all together, and cigarettes. Her grief for her romantic relationship with Matt is her actual albatross, a burden she carries alone until it is brought forcibly to the light by an incredibly drunk Frankie at a debauched party.
Then she must reveal it to her love interest Sam, almost a complete stranger, because the grief and the rift it causes when Frankie finds out is too much to handle alone. The novel sadly shows how isolated adolescents can be from the adults that care for them, and how they can completely fail them when faced with death. Death is hardly understood and well processed by adults, and often they have no idea to handle it with adolescents.
Adolescents however are not immune to these sort of horrible tragedies, and left to their bereavement alone leads to some serious growing pains like shown with Anna and Frankie. Sex is not inherently harmful for adolescents, rather it is a healthy part of coming of age, but sexual behavior can also be a form of self-harm or cry for help. This is an easy mistake that can make when one is alone and in pain.
There is nothing shameful about the sexual behavior depicted in the novel, rather it simply messy and human and reflects the behavior of bereaved teens with little guidance. The book is not for adults, but rather for teens who feel they can turn to no one else about sex, romance, and loss.
Perlmutter, Sammy.
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