>Life in the Old Girl Yet

>Nancy Drew parodies aren't new (one of my favorites is Mabel Maney's Case of the Good-for-Nothing Girlfriend) but Chelsea Cain's Confessions of a Teen Sleuth is exhaustive in trying out the dimensions of a metafictive life. In this "autobiography" (dedicated to Frank Hardy) Nancy is determined to clear up the mistakes made and lies put forth in a series of novels by an old college chum, Carolyn Keene. Nancy has problems of which Carolyn has no idea, such as an ongoing feud with Cherry Ames, simmering when the two meet at Joe Hardy's funeral, and later heating up when they are both on a panel at a feminist conference in 1975 at Vassar, where Nancy scoffs, "she can't even hold down a job. Dude ranch nurse. Cruise Nurse. Private Duty Nurse. Army Nurse. Rest home nurse. Ski nurse. One right after the other." Throughout, the various fiction worlds of the genre heroes intersect, as does Nancy's with the historical events of the twentieth century. Did you know that Hannah Gruen slept with Eisenhower?
Roger Sutton
Roger Sutton

Editor Emeritus Roger Sutton was editor in chief of The Horn Book, Inc., from 1996-2021. He was previously editor of The Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books and a children's and young adult librarian. He received his MA in library science from the University of Chicago in 1982 and a BA from Pitzer College in 1978.

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Anonymous

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Posted : Mar 23, 2008 03:26


Fern

>Gregory Maguire's really smart story "Honorary Shepherds" in the 1995 collection *Am I Blue* (ed. Marion Bauer) is a nifty example of a metafiction.

Posted : Mar 02, 2006 04:31


rindambyers

>Wah! I am metawhawha'd out.....I can see I have some reading to do.....

Posted : Mar 01, 2006 04:41


Beth

>Zusak's I am the Messenger. Maybe. Then again, maybe not.

Posted : Feb 28, 2006 08:31


Andy Laties

>Vonnegut on virtuality: “‘Mr. Trout,’ I said from the unlighted interior of the car, ‘you have nothing to fear. I bring you tidings of great joy.’ He was slow to get his breath back, so he wasn’t much of a conversationalist at first. ‘Are—are you—from the—the Arts Festival?’ he said. His eyes rolled and rolled. ‘I am from the Everything Festival,’ I replied. ‘The what?’ he said….‘Mr. Trout,’ I said, ‘I am a novelist, and I created you for use in my books.’ ‘Pardon me?’ he said. ‘I’m your Creator,’ I said. ‘You’re in the middle of a book right now—close to the end of it actually.’ ‘Um,’ he said….‘I am approaching my fiftieth birthday, Mr. Trout,’ I said. ‘I am cleansing and renewing myself for the very different sorts of years to come. Under similar spiritual conditions, Count Tolstoi freed his serfs. Thomas Jefferson freed his slaves. I am going to set at liberty all the literary characters who have served me so loyally during my writing career.’”—Kurt Vonnegut, Breakfast of Champions (New York: Delacorte, 1973): 298, 299, 301.

Kilgore Trout then runs away...

Andy Laties

Posted : Feb 28, 2006 06:53


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