The Death of Jayson Porter http://www.fishpond.co.nz/Books/Death-of-Jayson-Porter-Jaime-Adoff/9781423106920

By Jaime Adoff

Reviews

Gr 9 Up-Jayson Porter, 16, spends his days as a struggling scholarship student at a prep school in a wealthy Florida suburb, and the rest of his time at home in the projects avoiding his abusive white alcoholic mother, checking in on his wasted-on-crack black father, and smoking dope with his friend Trax. Jayson knows how to survive in "the hood," but the mounting pressures of his mother's beatings, his challenges at school, and his menial job build until he sees suicide as his only escape. The idea of jumping from the 18th-floor breezeway outside his apartment door entices him. Trax is killed in a meth-lab explosion, and then Jayson's father lets slip that he and Lizzie aren't really his parents, but stole him from their friend Trina when all were drug addicts living together. It's the last straw, and Jayson jumps, but only from the seventh floor. He survives but with a broken neck, narrowly missing serious paralysis, and facing months of surgery, therapy, and rehabilitation. Jayson's first-person narration throbs with the pain of his life, revealing the frightened teen behind the cocky exterior. Adoff writes candidly, with carefully chosen details carrying a wealth of insight, in a style approaching free verse that draws out the complexities of Jayson's character as he deals with sexuality, self-esteem, and identity. The ending is a bit too tidy, but Jayson is a vivid, dynamic character who will get under readers' skin.-Joyce Adams Burner, Hillcrest Library, Prairie Village, KS Copyright 2008 Reed Business Information.