Creating something meaningful is an impressive accomplishment. It's one of the biggest things you can do in life. Create something that matters to folks other than yourself and truly makes some sort of difference in their lives and you have made the world a better place. For many folks a little TV show in the late 90's going by the name of Freaks and Geeks did just that. It let people know they they weren't alone in their immense feelings of isolation in their formative years and that there were things that could help you survive and people who felt the same way you did. Unfortunately the ratings didn't pan out (didn't that happen to Arrested Development and Family Guy...) and so it was cancelled but that isn't why I bring this up. This show was genius, I'm talking the best show ever made, hands down, in terms of plot, cast, acting, and premise. And Paul Feig was responsible for it all.
When I bought the newly re-released full season of Freaks and Geeks in yearbook form (super cool and yet totally not worth the ridiculous price tag) I was so incredibly excited to see, while sitting in my classroom, an insert that creator Paul Feig had not only written a book, he had written a book for middle schoolers. So I immediately went online and ordered it. After school ended I couldn't hold back so I drove to the nearest book store (which didn't have it) and then went to another, larger book store farther away which did. I sped off and got situated so I could being reading what I was sure was going to be my next favorite book (Goodbye Mr. Sherman Alexie, the guy who created Freaks and Geeks is an author now, what did you do before writing?)
And oh boy did it go slowly.
Paul Feig wrote or co-wrote one third of the episodes for my favorite TV show ever and as such I led myself to believe that he would be a terrific writer of material for young adults and children. And in the television / movie sense he most certainly is. How he translates on paper is an entirely different story.
Completely lacking vivid description even the most lucid imagination (such as my own) had trouble imagining the worlds he was trying to create in Frequenaut. At times it even sounded as if Feig had given up instead of putting forth the effort to better describe them as well. There was little to no character development which made it hard to care much about Ignatius or Frank Gutenkunitz (the evil bully from the beginning of the story). The thing about television is you can have someone corner another person and call them "Sam Rear" and because you see it you can infer so much about the situation (as long as the acting is decent enough). If you write something like; "Frank cornered me and called me "Sam Rear" and I was really upset." You are not likely to grab the attention of the reader.
And so this book goes for 353 uninspired pages. Maybe I was expecting too much, that is possible. Whether it is true or not though I know as a reader I deserved more than I received. I guess I'll just wait until he makes something else I can watch, until then I can just be thankful for Freaks and Geeks.
