Gratz starts by showing us this world at Amy Anne’s school. And the words she does speak are never the truth. The Ordinary World (1): As I said above, Amy Anne’s ordinary world is one in which she thinks one thing and speaks another. (Or, you know, just read the book and enjoy it!)Īnyway, for those of you who might actually want several pages of craft analysis, here we go. Heads up: the post is going to be a REALLY long one, so I’m not going to put in examples-but, hey, you can go get the book and read it for yourself! Oh, also, there will be spoilers, so you may actually want to read the book first, then come back here. I’ve got the chart stashed for when I head back to my own book, but I want to do a blog post that identifies and describes the fundamental steps Amy Anne takes on her hero’s journey. I spent three hours last weekend breaking down that journey (and, frankly, the whole plot). Ban This Book is the perfect journey for a quiet, passive hero. There has to be a push-pull at the threshold and, for Amy Anne, there is no question that her first answer to the call will be to refuse it.īut I’m getting ahead of myself (and of Amy Anne).
Does Amy Anne jump right over the threshold, leaving the ordinary world behind her without a thought? Of course not.
Three you have it: The inciting incident. That is, not until she finds out that her favorite book has been “removed from” the school library. She speaks, but never the words (the truth) that she is thinking.
The hero in Ban This Book, Amy Anne Ollinger, wants nothing more than to curl up with a book whenever and wherever she possibly can. Recently, I read Alan Gratz’ Ban This Book. In part, this was definitely my difficulty with writing character-driven plots, but it was also that I could never figure out what this quiet, gentle boy would actually do to make trouble. There was a big disconnect between the “flavor” of the boy in my mind and the actions I was trying to make him do on the page. Posted by beckylevine on in Middle Grade, Plot, The Hero's Journey, Uncategorized | No Commentsīefore I plunged myself so deeply into picture books, I was struggling with a middle grade book in which the hero was too quiet, too passive.
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