All That Remains - Bruce Brooks

Three novellas tell of teens dealing with death.

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Common Sense rates it
4
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Book details
  • Author:Bruce Brooks
  • # of pages: 168
  • Publisher:Simon and Schuster BFYR
  • Original Publication Date: 02/19/2004
  • Genre: Fiction - Short Stories
  • Hardcover: $16.00
  • Publisher's Recommended Reading Level: 12+
  • Read Aloud: 11+
  • Read Alone: 12+

Parents need to know

Parents need to know that each of the three novellas in this book focuses on characters dealing with death and grief. There's a bit of strong language and drinking, as well as a same-sex relationship and some violence (hunting, bullying).

Families can talk about death -- how we deal with it, and what we do with the remains of the dead. Be prepared to have a serious conversation about the topic.

Message

Social Behavior:

Hunting deer with poisoned arrows.

Consumerism:

Drugs/Alcohol/Tobacco:

Beer drinking.

Violence

Hunting with bow and arrow. A boy is roughed up, another is seriously injured in a hockey game. Cut up rotted deer meat and innards are thrown into a bar.

Sex

A lesbian relationship, no details given.

Language

A few expletives.

Common Sense says

What's the story?

Reviewed by Amy Brotman

Three novellas tell of teens dealing with death, its aftermath, and the help of friends. In the first, two cousins help their aunt's lesbian partner cremate their aunt's body, despite laws prohibiting the cremation of those with AIDS. In the second a boy reluctantly tries to help his orphaned cousin. And in the last, three boys help a new friend disperse her father's ashes.

Is it any good?

4

What may sound dark and bizarre in synopsis is actually entertaining and uplifting on the page. Brooks's trademarks are his respect for intelligence, both that of the reader and of his characters, leading to the kind of subtle and clever dialogue more often seen on The West Wing than in children's books, and the wicked way he applies that intelligence to sports description. Both are amply on display here.

Hockey and golf are Brooks's favorite sports, and they figure prominently, and to great effect, in the second and third stories respectively. But it is in the first story that he lets loose what he calls "a more dicey aspect of my humor, a less classical narrative sense, and generally more peculiar subjects and shadows." A reviewer couldn't describe it better, except to say that in Brooks's hands peculiar seems to be synonymous with fascinating -- and often moving.

From the Book:
"A poor deer," said Marie.

"You're thinking of Bambi's mother," Sue said to her. "That's because you've never seen the deer around here up close, and also because you've never gone through several seasons of raising gorgeous perennials only to have some brazen deer mosey through your backyard nipping off the heads of every plant and killing them all. ... And let me tell you, they are thick, toothy, graceless things, except when they leap nimbly from the bushes out in front of a car and total it, killing two of the passengers."

Other choices

Other Books by Bruce Brooks
Everywhere
Midnight Hour Encores
The Moves Make the Man
No Kidding
What Hearts
The Wolfbay Wings series
Throwing Smoke
Vanishing
Dolores

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45 votes