Teen Fiction

Simon Says

Name: Simon Says
Author: Elaine Marie Alphin
ISBN: 9780152046781

by Elaine Marie Alphin

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Overview

Aspiring young artist, Charles Weston has enrolled in a private arts high school soley to meet the "famous" Graeme Brandt, a student whose recently published novel touched a chord deep within Charles.

But Graeme is not at all what Charles expected, and soon the two teen prodigies are drawn into a clash of wills that threatens to destroy them both.

An alienated, aspiring young painter who attends high school at a boarding school for the arts discovers that being true to himself means opening the door to both pain and pleasure.

Synopsis

Charles Weston, an aspiring young artist attending a private arts high school, discovers that being true to one's self means opening the door to both pain and pleasure.

Publishers Weekly

High school junior Charles Weston, whose paintings convey "truth" so powerfully that all who see them promptly fear and/or dislike him, has just arrived at Whitman, a boarding school for artists. The school's amenities notwithstanding, Charles has enrolled simply in order to meet Graeme Brandt, a senior, and author of a YA novel that Charles finds brilliant in its send-up of people's shallowness ("Life is just one big game of Simon Says.... Nobody even wants to admit they're playing"). Charles, who now refuses to let others see his paintings, is hoping that Graeme can show him "how to get beyond the game... show me how to keep from locking myself away inside a studio forever." While the boys connect immediately, Charles realizes that Graeme is also "playing," just like Graeme's protagonist ("He knew what Simon wanted before Simon even said anything"). When Charles pushes Graeme to find his true self ("You're nothing but a lifeless mirror that reflects everyone's expectations!"), Graeme commits suicide and camouflages it as a heart attack, leaving a note explaining his actions to Charles. Alphin (Counterfeit Son) adds texture by inserting Graeme's journals between Charles's narration, and she brings unusual candor to her portrayal of gay characters. But while the author taps into adolescent visions of the artist's life and the difficulties of being an individual, her constant reiteration of these themes grows tiresome. Metaphors run a little thick, and the quagmires seemed overcooked. Ages 14-up. (May) Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

About the Author, Elaine Marie Alphin

ELAINE MARIE ALPHIN is the author of Counterfeit Son, which received the 2001 Edgar Allan Poe Award for Best Young Adult Mystery. She lives in Indiana.

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Editorials

Publishers Weekly

From The Critics

For sixteen-year-old Charles Weston, life feels like a game of Simon Says, with parents, teachers, and peers imposing their expectations on him. Determined to figure out how to be true to himself and to his art, Charles enters a boarding school for gifted artists. A painful history of rejection leads him to close himself off from everyone, hiding the powerful truth about life in his painting. Captivated by the profundity of a fellow student's novel, Charles befriends the author. However, Charles discovers that the one he thought could show him how to escape the expectation game is really the best player of all. Capturing the inner reality of the artist, Simon Says wrestles with intense themes of identity, homosexuality, and suicide. High school students will find Charles' journey to self-expression thought provoking as he learns to connect with others, and to remain true to himself, regardless of others' expectations. 2002, Harcourt, 258 pp.,
— Sarah Gartland

KLIATT

This unusual and compelling novel takes readers inside Whitman High School for the Arts, where students argue about things like whether or not Ravel based his quartet on Debussy's work. Alphin takes readers into the psyches of students whose friendships are founded upon their passion for artistic expression. Against the wishes of his practical parents, Charles Weston has come to Whitman not to pursue his art studies but to meet Graeme Brandt, the young author of a novel called The Eye of the Storm. Because his novel mocks the great game of life, Simon Says, its author must know the secret of how to avoid reflecting back to others only the person they want to see. Unexpected help comes in the form of Adrian, a gay musician/composer, and Rachel, to whom Charles represents both a kindred spirit and also one of her most challenging puzzles to solve. If, in the final pages, the author expends unnecessary energy to drive home her point, she gets everything else just right. Do we choose who we are or are we born that way? These and other questions raised in the novel provide plenty of scope for discussion. KLIATT Codes: S—Recommended for senior high school students. 2002, Harcourt, 258p., Ages 15 to 18.
—Jessica Swaim

School Library Journal

Gr 8 Up-In this psychological novel, Charles enters a boarding school for the arts hoping to find a place where he can stay true to his nonconformist nature. Absorbed with painting in a vivid and distorted way, he wants to make friends with people who like him for himself and teachers who will accept his work. As in the children's game Simon Says, he finds himself mirroring others rather than pleasing himself. Charles knows that Graeme, a student writer whom he idolizes, shares a search for identity. Excerpts from Graeme's journal appear at intervals, revealing a parallel childhood. Elements of a homosexual crush draw the two together but the path to self-realization has a tragic end when Graeme commits suicide. As in many YA novels, the adults here are peripheral and antagonistic, providing a perfect setting for self-perceived isolation. Charles's musical roommate, Adrian, and the editor of the student journal, Rachel, are well-developed supporting characters who, as grounded individuals, become the ones who ultimately help the protagonist feel a sense of belonging. Plot development is emotional rather than eventful, and some of the details surrounding Graeme's death are not plausible. It defies logic that, in a small boarding school, Charles would learn about the teen's "fatal heart attack" from the newspaper. Still, adolescents will relate to the disconnected characters who feel painfully alone and will be encouraged by the acceptance of their uniqueness.-Vicki Reutter, Cazenovia High School, NY Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

Kirkus Reviews

This overly long novel explores large issues about Art and Truth, but fails to create compelling characters or plot that will keep readers engaged. While Alphin's highly readable Counterfeit Son (2000) crackled with suspense, this one sets the reader up for disappointment from the beginning. The first page describes the grave of a dead student, visited by his murderer. But there is no murder, only a suicide for which one character feels guilty. Telling rather than showing, narrator Charles explains why he transferred to an arts school as a junior. He presents himself in long, repetitive monologues as an arrogant, anguished painter, unappreciated by his parents and boorish teachers, ostracized by jealous classmates since preschool. His bleakly truthful paintings, executed without training, make everyone so uncomfortable that they reject him. Now he won't let anyone see his paintings for fear of further rejection, conveniently overlooking the fact that he won a scholarship based on his art. At the boarding school, he forms a tentative friendship, heightened by sexual tension, with Graeme, a senior famous for having a novel published as a sophomore. Charles hopes Graeme can tell him how to survive without conforming to others' expectations, but Graeme's occasional journal entries reveal how few answers he has. While Charles's self-righteous, self-absorbed character is plausible, his voice quickly becomes tedious. Some teenage artists may see themselves here, but most readers will tire of Charles long before his final epiphany about life and art. (Fiction. YA)