The Realm of Possibility

Twenty teen voices sound off in twenty eclectic poems, and the effect is a rousing chorus of love and life in one high school community. The monologues gently unfold interwoven stories of friendship, romance, grief, unrequited crushes, and sexual experimentation that exhibit an authentic sense of teen angst but also convey remarkable optimism. The diverse characters constantly challenge their stereotypes: the buff jock who shows genuine tenderness toward his troubled girlfriend, the mean girl who has an epiphany of emotional intelligence, the devout gospel singer who connects with the loner goth. Strong gay and lesbian characters, too, pour their hearts into distinctive free verse, and it is in fact the touching portrait of a gay couple show more celebrating their first anniversary that anchors the narrative.

My VOYA ratings: 5Q (“Hard to imagine it being better written”) and 3P (“Will appeal with pushing”). With such an impressive variety of characters and relationships and poetic styles, young readers will be hard pressed not to identify and empathize with someone in this book. While its free verse form may deter those who are not into poetry, the stellar quality of the writing and characterization makes it worth pushing.

I looked forward to finally reading David Levithan but was unsure what to expect from a novel in verse. Well, I loved this one. "Escapade," a poem that pays subtle homage to the friendship of Weetzie and Dirk of Weetzie Bat fame, also makes a direct reference to My So-Called Life, and indeed, I detected an overall vibe similar to the most empowering moments of that show. My only complaint was that the chapter and section titles made it difficult to track who's who. A comprehensive table of contents at the beginning would have been easier to refer to than the five separate lists of names before each section. show less

"Here's what I know about the realm of possibility-
it is always expanding. It is never what you think it is.
Everything around us was once deemed impossible. From the airplane overhead to the phones in our pockets to the choir girl putting her arm around the metalhead.
As hard as it is for us to see sometimes, we all exist within the realm of possibility. Most of the limits are of our own world's devising. And yet, every day we each do so many things that were once impossible to us."
The Realm of Possibility delves beneath the surface of the people we see every day. Instead of the tired, one-dimensional labels used in too many YA novels like The Jock, The Popular Girl, and The Gay Kid, we get The Girl Who Buys Pot for Her Sick Mother, The show more Boy Whose Girlfriend is in Love with Holden Caulfield, and The Girl Who Writes on Walls. Except we get twenty viewpoints- one from each of them.
And each of their narrations is special, with a voice separate from all the rest. It's fascinating to get a bite-sized chunk of someone's life, people you know and didn't think you did, who remind you of yourself or someone else- the girl you sit next to in Spanish class, the guy your sister is dating, the enigmatic friend- to get to see through their eyes and hear through their voices for a bit.
The Realm of Possibility by David Levithan is humorous, dark, lovable and deeply true, with characters as real as they are different. It's a look into how different people go through the same things, how we hesitate over the same dilemmas and share the same sorrows and joys as people we may not have thought twice about.
This book is about so many things. It's about The Big Ones, like Love, Loss, Grief, Breaking Up, Getting Over It. It's about being mean, being nice, being smart, being who you are. It's about getting back up, getting even, getting marijuana. It's about new discoveries, new love, new embarrassment, new sensations, new friends. About cigarettes and prom dresses and notebooks and our actions, big and small, and how they're perceived by others.
But mostly, as per its title, it's about all the possibilities we hold precariously in our hand at any given moment- the possibility that everything will turn out okay, and the possibility that it won't, as well as all the ways- kind and cruel, meaningful and trivial- that we connect with those around us.
There's a lot we can learn from teenagers, a lot that plenty adults refuse to hear or read, simply writing them off as horny emotional hormone factories. I hate when adults pretend like they were never teens themselves, but adolescence is really a time when you either find out who you are or try to get as far away as possible from it, and it is seldom isn't always pretty. I can see why people would want to distance themselves from it.
But to all the people that would, I would tell them to read this book first, and with an open mind. I would tell them to listen to the sex, to the awkwardness that comes with being a young adult, but also to the profound love and grief and pain that these characters feel. You might not like everything you read in it, but that's as natural as not liking everybody you meet.
-Mia show less

This book was an incredibly awkward, at times painful read, in the most beautiful way possible. I love the way that all the characters are connected to each other, even if they themselves do not see it, or even know each other/ feature in the other's story.

This book was a return trip to high school angst. It contained everything I managed to escape during my own adolescence. They guy I thought was my first love is as close as I get to the stories within. Was it just me or did the church girl remind y'all of one Mercedes Jones of Glee fame (the character not the actress).

Though I would not read this book again, I think it is one of those prolific, and profound, books that everyone ought to read once.

4 Claddagh rings out of 5.

While clever to have each 'character" represented by a different style of poetry, I found it hard to keep track of the various characters. The poems themselves were heartfelt and moving, it just was hard for me to appreciate it in its entirety. I did take a few breaks in reading this, and that might have made it more difficult, but I don't feel I should have to read a book in one sitting to follow it. That said, I love the way he writes, I just need to try a different style.

A teenager's thoughts about love--their confused, conflicting feelings about things---actually make for interesting poems. These poems aren't flowery or trite. They're honest, intimate. Each poem tells a different story told in an interesting way, with small surprises at the beginnings and endings of many a line. As a reader, I most appreciated the poems that had a narrative arc---most do, but some are stronger than others. It took some time for me to realize that each poem was told by a different speaker, and that the speakers were classmates who knew each other. I think it would have been helpful had the author clarified this point early on in the book.

I've never read a book of poetry quite like this. Each poem of Levithan's tells a story, but they are sometimes loosely connected (which you don't notice until the end -- and it's very effective). The poems are usually several pages, written in different styles, but on the whole, they are mostly quite powerful. I didn't like all the poems and obviously there were those I liked more than others. But that's the way it is with all collections. Overall, if you like Levithan's writing and don't mind poetry, this is a good book to read.

Possibly one of the most wonderful books i have ever read. Written in a variety of poems, it can be a bit hard to follow, and it took me a long time to read, to figure out who was speaking etc. But the author perfectly captures the moods of the different characters, and the book becomes incredibly absorbing.
Some may not be comfortable with some issues included, but i think that if one persists, this book rewards.
Over all, brilliant.