Scan barcode
A review by davenash
How to Be Safe by Tom McAllister
2.0
If Franny Glass lived today in a small Pennsylvania town instead of the world of JD Salinger, she might be like Anna Crawford, protagonist and narrator of How to Be Safe. It's interesting that both male authors choose a unreliable, socially dysfunctional female narrator, to expose society's sanctimony.
What makes this book marketable and trendy is it's examination of gun culture through the eyes of the people living in the hinterlands. Of course it's written by an east coast elite.
What makes this book interesting is the main character's nonconformity. Like Salinger, there's sharp humor directed at the conventional ways and popular culture of the time.
On building a moment to the school shooting:
"They felt delighted to commemorate the worse moment in their town's history."
On unreliability:
"It's hard to say whether I was lying then or if I am lying now."
On dignity:
"I had to make a choice, leave calmly with my dignity or continue to shout as they dragged me away.
Dignity is overrated."
On truth:
"Adults should always lie to their kids. Kids should have the luxury of not knowing their parents"
On mothers:
"Children love their mothers even if their mothers don't love them. It's a structural defect."
Anna has already lost her job before the shooting. She's not leaving her house until the FBI drags her away. After they let her go, reputation and home ruined, she enters into a shallow relationship with a man-child. Eventually she moves on.
How to Be Safe is more about the hypocrisy, or as Salinger would say the phonies, of a small town life than examining gun violence. How To Be Safe achieves emotional release through comedy not examination.
What makes this book marketable and trendy is it's examination of gun culture through the eyes of the people living in the hinterlands. Of course it's written by an east coast elite.
What makes this book interesting is the main character's nonconformity. Like Salinger, there's sharp humor directed at the conventional ways and popular culture of the time.
On building a moment to the school shooting:
"They felt delighted to commemorate the worse moment in their town's history."
On unreliability:
"It's hard to say whether I was lying then or if I am lying now."
On dignity:
"I had to make a choice, leave calmly with my dignity or continue to shout as they dragged me away.
Dignity is overrated."
On truth:
"Adults should always lie to their kids. Kids should have the luxury of not knowing their parents"
On mothers:
"Children love their mothers even if their mothers don't love them. It's a structural defect."
Anna has already lost her job before the shooting. She's not leaving her house until the FBI drags her away. After they let her go, reputation and home ruined, she enters into a shallow relationship with a man-child. Eventually she moves on.
How to Be Safe is more about the hypocrisy, or as Salinger would say the phonies, of a small town life than examining gun violence. How To Be Safe achieves emotional release through comedy not examination.