I'm Voting for @GordoJack - Reflecting on YOUR OWN WORST ENEMY

I ran for student office once. I was in 8th grade and I wanted to be the President of the junior Honor Society and, unbeknownst to me at the time, I ran against a young woman who would become my friend, eventually valedictorian of a huge high school, Ms. North Syracuse, and an all-out athlete who would go onto to an Ivy-League school as a pre-med student.

Ha! I thought I stood a chance.

Nope. I was creamed.

Perhaps this is why I absolutely loved reading Your Own Worst Enemy written by Gordon Jack, a resident of San Francisco and a high school librarian, and why I will definitely check into The Boomerang Effect, his first novel. Why? Easy - he's a whimsical writer who gets the pulse of adolescents, but also the humor of any election process given the vast viewpoints of a heterogenous society.

I've never been a Stacey, but I've worked alongside them my entire life. They are polished go-getters who read the cultural landscape to place their personal agendas before everyone else's and who will manipulate and work through systems to achieve their personal gains. Still, they are human and this comes with flaws, self-afflicted high standards, and a competitive drive that serves them well. I don't have that in me.

I've lived a life wishing I was more Tony Guo, a type B personality who has one platform - to bring chocolate milk back to the school cafeteria and to find the next party so he can get intoxicated with any and all poisons that will help him to attain a care-free life.

I've longed for Julia, the multicultural girl in search of a new reputation after being part of a social media scandal at her old school in Canada - a believable kid who got caught up in the popularity game of dating and the horrendous power struggles of boyfriends and girlfriends, jealousy and mischief. But she came to Lincoln High School for a new life.

The problem for all three, however, is the sibling rivalry of Brian and Kyle, who both are involved in the Presidential election for the GSA. Brian's in love with Julia, but best friends with Stacey, and Kyle...well, Kyle simply wants to use his Mohawk nickname to the best of his abilities...to punk out the entire student body to help Tony, the pothead, win.

Phew! We have a plot, and given the 2016 election as a symbolic landscape the wars begin. What will achieve presidential success? Populist votes (chocolate milk appeals to freshman), multicultural perspectives (Lincoln High School is a diverse environment, but has little governmental representation), or party traditions ("We speak for xxxx, because xxxx should be important for us all"). The result? 436 pages of story, character development, intrigue, humor and...well...politics.

Gordon Jack sat on a panel with me during the Saugatuck StoryFest in Westport, Connecticut, and a few weeks later a friend of his sent me an advanced reader's copy (ARC) of the book. I started it at the airport on my way to the National Council of Teacher's of English and finished it by the time I landed in Houston. My 14-hour trip gave me plenty of reading time. I knew I had a good book in my hand because I began doggy-earing pages of the book, because I was thinking about how Your Own Worst Enemy might be paired in Civics or Political Science class as a Young Adult Novel accompaniment.

In the end, I loved the entire read and can't help but be drawn to Brian (although he spells his name wrong). Here's a young man who simply works behind the scenes to help his friend get elected, but then falls in love with her opponent (hint: it's not Tony, although Stacey wouldn't be surprised). Brian moves the story along, trying to do what is right and to conceal his bodily functions (he can't help himself or the way his random urges present themselves in class).

In the end, we all know the individuals who come forward to be part of Lincoln High School's student government election. What we tend not to know is the thick dimensions behind characters who act as they do.

Fun. Worthwhile. Poignant. Clever.

Those are the 4 words I'm attributing to reading Gordon Jack's 2nd novel. As the jacket says, "When they go low, we go slightly lower," is the case of getting votes in a high school election. There are so many ways to anger the constituency when you are fighting to get the most votes. Sadly, we tend not to pay enough attention to what the majority want or need.

Democracy is hard and Lincoln High is a metaphor for it.