I just finished Paranoid Park and wanted to write my impressions down while the heavy fugue of the novel was still in my head, in the air, so to speak. This book really had a Hitchcockian “Strangers on a Train” kind of flavor. Some average schmuck suddenly finds his life turned upside down when he meets a sinister stranger. This is that kind of schadenfreude-type escapist fiction: “Thank god that’s not me! ” But of course that’s the whole point. No, it’s not you, but what if it was? Oooo, the delicious thrill of voyeurism, safe in your own bed!
And he was so terribly alone. There was absolutely no one he could go to. Our society just doesn't have an 800 number for everything. I really put myself not only in his place, but in the place of an adult that he might confide in. I couldn't decide which situation would be worse.
Maybe this was just weak character development on the author’s part, but I feel like this event is the most interesting thing that’s happened to this nameless kid. (I’m correct aren’t I? Did anyone else notice his name being used? Very Rebecca no?) He’s so bland, everything in his life is so ho-hum. Even his parent’s divorce, while emotionally affecting to a certain degree, is still being accepted without much fanfare on anyone’s part. Reader’s don’t even find out why his parents are splitting up. Just your basic white, upper middle class divorce, folks, nothin’ to see here…
Of course, the reader finds themselves rooting for him, caring about his anguish. But did he do the right thing, for society and for himself? I didn’t want him to get in any trouble for what happened, at all. One could use the phrase, “Get away with it”, but there’s no getting away, or doing away, with what happened. He’s a different person now. Traumatized and challenged with finding a way to live with it. He’ll never know if would have been any easier because he made the choice to keep it to himself. This ending reminded me of another recent homage to Hitchcock, Woody Allen’s Match Point. Just what did that antihero really get away with? Both characters are left knowing they are going to have personal demons camping out in their psyche for the rest of their lives.
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For teens who frequently try to get away with something this really is an interesting read. Fooling adults is a great treat for a teen but when does that backfire?
As I read your post I thought again about the teen visitors to our class who talked about wanting adults to listen and wanting adults who were available to talk to them. Where were they in this book? The police?
No surprise I think that this book has already been optioned for a movie.
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