Jeremias reviews:

Twelve

by

Nick McDonell: 

2002

à Summary

à Assessment

à Extract

à The reviewer’s personal opnion

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Summary:

The story is set in New York a few days before New Year’s Eve. The narrator tells the story of different characters, who know each other through different ways. He describes the life of different teenagers, who are all in touch with drugs. The story leads to a New Year´s Eve party and this is where all characters overlap and a surpising ending takes place…

 “White Mike” is one of the dealers and supplies the others with different kinds of drugs, mostly Marijuana, but also a drug called “Twelve”. One of his customers is Chris, who makes parties at his parents´ house. He comes, like most characters in the story, from a rich background, which means he can afford everything he wants, such as drugs. There are some teenagers like Jessica who already are addicted to drugs and would do anything to get their “Twelve”, which, by the way, costs a lot of money. Another drug addict is the beautiful Sara. She organizes the New Year’s Eve party at Chris` house and invites all of her admirers. Chris` brother Claude is crazy about all sorts of weapons. He has just bought an Uzi with a fake ID and has already a few guns and swords.

At the New Year’s Eve party almost everybody is doing drugs and it happens that Jessica orders Twelve from another drug dealer, Lionel, who is a friend of White Mike´s. Jessica has no money so she agrees to have sex with the drug dealer to get her Twelve. The situation then escalates as White Mike shows up at the party and finds the two having sex. White Mike recognizes Lionel as the murderer of another drug dealer and wants to kill him. As the first gunshots are fired, Chris` brother suddenly comes out of his room with his Uzi firing aimlessly at the party guests. After killing a few innocent teenagers he shoots himself in the head, before the police arrive. This is how the story ends.

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Assessment:

The story is written in a very unusual way. Almost every two pages the point of view changes. This makes the book in one way hard to read, but in another way it makes the story exciting. Because of this you sometimes read about a particular situation twice but from different points of views and you understand the situation better with that additional information. The main narrator is White Mike. Most chapters are written from his point of view and his thoughts and memories are also written in italics.

As a teenager, who has many of the same problems as the teenagers in the book have, you can identify with the characters described (altough hardly anybody in our environment is addicted to drugs in the same way as the characters in the book are). This makes the book mostly interesting for young people, but also for older people who want to understand the problems of young people. The story is set in the United States, where the drug problem is definitely a bigger problem than it is in Europe. Also gunshootings occur more often in the States than here, but in spite of this the subject is not less a burning issue here.

When you read the story you wouldn`t expect an ending like that. During the whole of the story almost everything is about drugs and then suddenly there is a gunfight like a massacre at the end, which is very unexpected.

The language is very easy to understand and sounds like spoken language, which is usual among teenagers. The events which are described in a very exciting way give a good insight into the attitudes of young people, especially in America and in rich circumstances. This is why I can recommend this book to everybody who is interested in this  topic.

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Extract

This passage is almost at the end at Chris` home party. White Mike appears at the party and shows up in the room where Lionel and Jessica are having sex. He recognizes the gun of his old friend and murdered drug dealer Charlie and realizes  that it was Lionel who killed Charlie...

“What the fuck?” Lionel says, and rolls, naked, off the far side of the bed. He pulls a small shiny .38 Special with a bright white pearl handle from his parka on the floor and stands up, pointing it at White Mike, erection wilting fast. His regular gun is in the other pocket. Jessica is covering herself with a sheet.

White Mike recognizes Charlie`s gun. “Oh man,” he says.

“Fuck,” says Lionel, lowering the gun. “What do you want?

“I don`t know,” White Mike says, but he takes a step toward Lionel, and Lionel is startled by the look in his eyes. He raises the gun again.

“I know that gun. Charlie`s gun, Lionel.”

“He was on some shit, and he pulled it on me.”

“And you killed him and took it.”

“What the fuck.” Lionel holds the pistol level.

White Mike just stares at him.

“You`d shot him too.”

And then White Mike launches himself across the room, grabbing for the gun, thinking he is going to kill Lionel.

Lionel fires two shots. One of the bullets hits White Mike, who falls heavily into the drum set. The other bullet hums just over Jessica`s head and explodes the aquarium, and the water spills onto Jessica and the bed, and the piranhas are snapping their jaws and flopping in the broken tank. Lionel grabs his clothes and is out the door and into the hall, naked. All the kids start running down the stairs. Claude`s door flies open, and he is suddenly huge in the hall, a sword strapped to his back, the Uzi in one hand.

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Personal Opinion

The issues which are set out in the book are very interesting for me because of their relevance to the present. One of the  issues is massacres among young people. In the film “Bowling for Columbine” this is well illustrated in the example of the “Littleton massacre”. “Bowling for Columbine” is one of my favorite documentary films. I think it shows how teenagers are taught to be as they are, and you have to fight the problem by its roots and create a better environment for teenagers. If they have nothing to do, they do things out of boredom which they wouldn`t do if you gave them something else to do. The drug problem (which, in our society, is more an alcohol problem) is attributed to the pressure which is exercised by the media. They spread fear and affect young people enormously. For many young people the consumption of drugs is then an escape from their strenuous reality. You can`t solve the problem by prohibition for under 21 year olds. Prohibition (as in the States) only moves the problem and  doesn´t solve it. This problem can`t be solved easily and only over a longer period of time.

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