There are some books from my childhood that never seem to leave the radar. If my little brother’s got them out of the library while I’m home, I’ll check out from the conversation and curl up with an old friend.

One such book is Henry Reed, Inc., by Keith Robertson. (and indeed, all five in the Henry Reed series.)

Henry Reed

Henry Reed’s parents are in the diplomatic service. So although he’s travelled worldwide with them, he has yet to experience any kind of normal adolescent lifestyle. He’s sophisticated and eloquent, and extremely dry.

The books are the journal he keeps over the summer, staying with his aunt and uncle in the 5-house town of Grover’s Corner, NJ.

Journal Style

One of the masterful things that Robertson accomplishes with these books is an utmost adherence to the creative writing guideline of “show, don’t tell.”

When writing first person, there’s a tremendous temptation to save on words and fill out sentences with bare moods. After all, it’s a first-person perspective, they can just go ahead and say how they’re feeling, can’t they?

One of the charms of Henry Reed is that no matter how absurd the situation is that he finds himself in, he never admits to it. He simply carries on presenting facts for the digestion of the reader.

Others

I encounted a similar narrative style at home on the weekend, re-discovering Sid Fleischman’s book Humbug Mountain.

One final example that deserves mention is The Chicken Doesn’t Skate, simply because the characters that Korman presents in this instance are all ridiculous caricatures, and yet their own self-righteous opinions of each other are conveyed beautifully through the situations and actions, rather than by talking to the reader.

Mike

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