American Author Project Blog 1

My American Author Proposal:

For my American Author paper I would like to further investigate and study the works of the American author C.D. Payne. C.D. Payne is the critically acclaimed author of the underground dark-humor series The Adventures of Nick Twisp as well as other works not in the series. The first novel in the series is titled Youth in Revolt and this is where I am proposing to start.
It is a sad fact for me to admit, but I don’t read for entertainment very often. This could be because I do not have much free time but the more likely explanation is that my generation is drawn more towards visual media such as movies and the Internet instead of towards literature. This being said, it is a rare occurrence that I sit down and read a book without giving up on it after the first chapter or deciding it is not for me. This simply, is what draws me to C.D. Payne as an author, he is able to keep my attention and cause me to almost immediately love reading his stories.
When I first head about C.D. Payne his debut novel Youth in Revolt was being recommended to me by an adult who is a very important figure in my life. He encouraged me to sit down and read the first few pages out loud to him (he had the book with him) to see how I liked it. In a lot of fictional novels the first few pages are dedicated to introducing the reader to the protagonist. This fact was true for Youth in Revolt, however, unlike a lot of other fictional novels I immediately liked the main character. Nick Twisp is a fourteen-year-old boy who throughout the novel, which is written as his journal, transforms from a brown-nose honor student to a modern youth in revolt.
I have to admit; probably the one thing that really drew me to the book is the connection that I feel with Nick Twisp. He’s young, he’s witty, he knows what he wants and how to get it, and he doesn’t take no for an answer. Not only is the main protagonist of Youth in Revolt an “awesome” character but the way C.D. Payne writes, quite simply, makes me happy. His tone throughout the novel is one that I especially can relate to, dry, sarcastic, and subtly humorous.
For my American Author paper I propose reading two of the novels in the Nick Twisp series and one of C.D. Payne’s independent novels. The titles of the books that I propose reading are Youth in Revolt, Revolting Youth: The Further Journals of Nick Twisp, and either Frisco Pigeon Mamba or Civic Beauties.