Weetzie Bat

Block, F. L. (1989). Weetzie Bat. New York: Harper & Row.  ISBN 0064408183

Plot Summary

                      Weetzie Bat, bleached blond, buzzcut, decked out in feathers and fringe and beads, and her mohawked best friend Dirk live their carefree lives in the dreamy, sugar-spun landscape of Los Angeles.  They spend their days hunting cute boys, who they call ducks, and their nights dancing and losing themselves in the LA. club scene.  When Weetzie is given a genie in a bottle, she wishes for she and Dirk each to find their own true love and settle down together forever in a beautiful little house.  The years pass for Weetzie and Dirk and their tailor-made wished-for ducks in a splendor of mutual love and friendship, unconventional family, and the ups and downs of life.  Weetzie learn about herself, about love and death, and about how to truly find and keep happiness in this rollicking, flighty fairy tale for adults. 

Critical Analysis

                          Francesca Lia Block paints her world and her characters with whimsy and abandon.  Weetzie and Dirk’s backdrop of Los Angeles pulsates with life, color, tastes, smells, and the randomness of its inhabitants, as when the driver of the car next to theirs tosses a hairpiece onto Weetzie’s lap, apropos of nothing.  Weetzie pops the hairpiece on a rubber chicken which she flies out the window of Dirk’s car as they coast through the city.  It is this kind of moment that characterizes the story of Weetzie Bat.  The pace of this novel is breakneck, galloping and skimming through time, dipping down into significant moments long enough to allow the reader to experience rich sensory elements. Her language is lush - long, bright strings of images and details strung together like beads.  The reader tastes the food the characters eat, smells the air they breathe, feels the kisses and the swoon of falling in love and the striking moments of unhappiness contrasting this bubbly tale.    It is perhaps the language that characterizes this novel most of all.  In some places there is a breathless rushing and lack of detail as Block speeds her characters through time - as with Weetzie’s pregnancy - and in others she lingers over a single thought or moment so that it takes full impact on the reader – as with Weetzie and My Secret Agent Lover Man’s first kiss.  This novel is definitely a light, quick read, but the characters and the glossy beauty of the world they live in will resonate long after the book is over.   

Reader’s Annotation

                                 Weetzie Bat and her best friend Dirk search for love, happiness, and security in Los Angeles, their personal playground.  As their patchwork family swells, they find themselves learning both beautiful and hard lessons about what can be gained and lost when you allow someone into your heart.

About the Author

                            Francesca Lia Block was born and still lives in Los Angeles and, as such, makes this the setting of most of her novels.  She has been praised for presenting the unique urban landscape and subculture of Los Angeles more accurately than anyone since Raymond Chandler.  Her novels are described as modern, edgy fairy tales that explore the whole spectrum of human emotions but more than anything extol the virtues and power of love.

                            Wildly popular with both young adults and adults, Block has achieved a number of honors, such as the Margaret A. Edwards Lifetime Achievement Award and the Phoenix Award.  She has also been cited by the American Library Association and the School Library Journal.  Her work has been published and translated all over the world.

Genre

         Fantasy - urban fantasy

Challenge Issues

                          Possible challenge issues in this book include sex, drinking, drugs, open relationships, promiscuity, homosexuality, and pregnancy out of wedlock.  In the event of a challenge, I would consult the challenge defense file prepared for this book.  The challenge defense file would include: positive reviews from credible sources for the purpose of proving merit to the challenger; negative reviews in order to inform me on what might be challenged; a written explanation of my own rationale for including the book in the collection as well as a summary of the plot; the American Library Association Bill of Rights; a review of my branch’s selection policy; and, as a last resort, an explanation of the reconsideration policy for my library and an official reconsideration form.

Curriculum Ties

                         English and Writing: form, imagery, and language.

Booktalk

              This punky, irreverent fairy tale is quick and fun to read, but heartfelt and peppered with life events that everyone must face.  Weetzie Bat creates an alternative kind of family life for herself and feels both the rewards and consequences of living outside the lines.  Reading this will open your eyes to other kinds of families, other kinds of love, and how to follow your heart instead of following the rules.

Reading Level and Interest Age

                                                    Grades 8-12, although the seeming lightness of this story might appeal more to grades 8-10.

                                                  

Why I Included This Book

                                          Weetzie Bat is a deceptively simple book.  Block couches serious issues such as drug use, alternative lifestyles, sexual orientation, and death in a candy-coated fairytale that can be read in an afternoon.  Because this book seems so happy, the reader flies through it without getting bogged down.  But parts of the story will resonate long after.  Approaching these issues from a very positive, whimsical perspective is somewhat less common in the modern world of dark young adult literature.  Weetzie Bat provides contrast.  For this reason it belongs in any collection.

References

Block, F.L. (2010). Bio. Retrieved from http://www.francescaliablock.com/bio