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The first time T-Boom held the moon to my nose, his fingers were warm and shaking. He whispered sniff hard, and so I did, feeling something bitter drip down the back of my throat and then my head filling up with so many different and beautiful things that I had to lean back against the wall. I could feel something that must have been heaven moving through my body so fast and slow at the same time that I didn’t know if I wanted to laugh real loud or cry or just let T-Boom move closer to me, lean in and add his kisses to all the beautiful other things.
Laurel is finally at a good place in her life – with a best friend, a place on the cheerleading squad, and a star athlete for a boyfriend. But when he introduces her to meth, she immediately falls under its spell. She loves how it makes her feel bigger than all the people she’s lost. But those good feelings are fleeting, and as her addiction grows, the people she loves lose faith in her. Laurel finds herself out in the cold, and only she can decide if she is going to stay there.
Any fiction writer knows just how difficult the first person point of view is to orchestrate. If done well, the reader can become totally immersed in the story. If done poorly – utter catastrophe. That being said, I’d like to commend Jacqueline Woodson who succeeds beautifully in the first person narrative voice. Her realistic novel, Beneath a Meth Moon, traces the events in the life of Woodson’s protagonist, Laurel Daneau, as she begins experimenting with meth – or “moon” as she calls it.
At 15, Laurel has already been through some pretty rough patches, and Woodson does a marvelous job of weaving elements of her back story into the plot. She’s moved from Mississippi, to Jacksonville; finally ending up in Galilee where she begins a new life fully equipped with a new best friend, a spot on the high school’s cheerleading squad, and a co-basketball-captain boyfriend to boot. But even in the midst of her new and exciting life, Laurel is still haunted by memories of the storm that killed her mother and grandmother back in the Pass Christian.
When Laurel hooks up with T-Boom, I’ll be honest; I was half-expecting this to turn into some high school romance story. Particularly because in the initial pages T-Boom tries to convince Laurel that they’re both strong enough to shake their meth addiction. But this isn’t the case at all (Thank God). In fact, Woodson quickly abandons the love-sick teenager realm and drops her readers right square in the middle of drug dependency.
The voice of Laurel is brilliant, unbelievably realistic and dead on for a 15 year old. There were moments that catapulted me right back to my own high school frame of mind. What was really impressive was Woodson’s voice in regards to the language of the addiction. There is a sense of innocence and confliction that yields to such intelligence. For this, I applaud Woodson.
Over all, I really enjoyed this book. It’s an easy read, with excellent pacing throughout. Plus it tugs at your heart strings with every mention of Laurel’s daddy and Jessie, Jr. (her baby brother). My only issue with the book is the quickness of the craving. One minute we’re out back behind a 7-Eleven watching Laurel take her first hit, and the next we’ve jumped to full-blown addiction. The pacing in this one spot seemed off. I understand that with any drug dependency, the addiction may move quickly – but I wanted more steps in between. Nonetheless, kudos to Jacqueline Woodson for taking what seems to be a risk in YA literature. I’ve got a soft spot for realistic fiction, and Woodson’s work is raw and timely – so, nicely done.
4 Bards!
Moving! 