#tbt: Deadline by Chris Crutcher

Deadline by Chris Crutcher. 316 p. Greenwillow Books/ HarperCollins Publisher, September, 2007. 9780060850890. (Own.)

Happy Thursday, TMS Readers! As we slide onto the downside of our February break, I hope you are reading lots and having fun. #tbt features Deadline by Chris Crutcher, one of my favorite authors. Deadline was published in 2007. Eighteen-year-old Ben Wolf is our narrator. The fact that Ben is eighteen is very important here because when he gets his routine yearly sports physical and blood tests show he has a fatal blood disease and maybe one year to live, with or without treatment, Ben decides against treatment and demands confidentiality from his doctor. His mother suffers from a debilitating mental illness and his rock-steady father is often on the road. He wants to live his best life in the time he has. Weepie warning! You will cry! But you will also laugh and fall in love with Ben Wolf.

My "Daily Booktalks" for the morning news show, my TMS Reads group in Schoology and for the Closter Public Library's FB page are, by necessity short. It is here on my blog where I can carry on a bit more when I have the time or inclination.

Last week, while making room on the YA shelves at school, I realized that I never featured Chris Crutcher on a #tbt post! I can't remember how I learned of him or which of his books I read first, but I've read most of them and adored them all. Choosing which to feature was a tough one. I opted for Deadline partly because it's the newest of his older titles and partly because my personal copy happens to be signed by him.

I had read it already when I attended an ALAN workshop in 2007. I saw him at the Author Cocktail Party and raved about the book and how it should've come with a box of tissue. Oh, how I cried. I hadn't started blogging yet so I've no record of my thoughts about the book but it sure did stick with me over the years. I nearly got sucked into settling in to reread it as I created this post. As luck should have it, a copy was in the box and he spoke at the workshop, so I hopped on the signing line and got this: