Dirt Road Home

Dirt Road Home

YA fiction
In Dirt Road Home Watt Key has created a rarity. It's a high
quality highly relevant read for high school boys who would rather do
anything but read. It's also a cautionary must read for adults. More
and more kids are going to juvie and prison for stuff that would have
earned them in school penalties back in the day. More and more of
these institutions are becoming privatized. A lot of bad stuff is
going down.
As the story starts Hal is being delivered to the Hellenweiler
Boys' Home. He wants to stay clean, do his time, and be reunited with
his recovering alcoholic father and his girl friend. A lot easier
said than done, it turns out.
For one thing the other boys belong to rival gangs: the
Ministers and the Hounds. New boys are solicited by both groups.
Staying apart, which is what Hal wants to do, is a very dangerous
option.
His peers, however, are the least of Hal's problems. The people
who run the place are more concerned with image management than the
boys' safety and well being. They can put whatever they want on their
records to make inmates sound evil and dangerous. They can even
withhold medical care if too many boys being injured would put their
institution under scrutiny.
I highly recommend this poignant coming of age story to teens,
parents, teachers, and guidance counselors.
On a personal note, we had a bit of an ice storm this morning. Scads
of churches were cancelled. In fact Maine Catholics were given
permission to cut without having to confess in the interests of
safety. YOWZA! That hardly ever happens.
A great big shout out goes out to people who advocate for the kids
most folks don't want to be bothered thinking about.
Julia Emily Hathaway


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