Picture View

[This is one of Piper's supposed methods of understanding people. Her hearing aid from childhood does not help her as much as one would hope though.]


[This is the best way the Piper has to understand people. Lip reading. Although she is perfect at this, this can be limited too simple, the turning of one's back to her.]


[Overall, to almost every deaf person you'll meet, this is the most preferred method of communication. This effects Piper a lot because her dad's lack of sign language shows how he chooses to ignore her due to his disappointment in her loss of hearing.]


[Piper has a person secretly sending her messages to help her understand music, specifically rock and roll. Initially, she is told to go see Kurt Cobain's house. In learning about Cobain, she started to understand the nature of rock and the passion that some have for it. Kurt Cobain was a unique individual who brought his non-mainstream band to popularity and ran a powerful, destructive life until the all to soon end at the age of 27.]

 
[This was the second rock god that Piper was sent to. She visits where he grew up, and the shack that he grew up in shows how hard life was for him growing up. All that he had to hold on to was his love for music. He grew to be one of the best guitarists of all time. He also belonged to the unfortunate 27 club.]


[One of the main issues with the band is that they weren't really together. They were all separate players, and in music, listening to each other is vital. Piper had to get the band united, both musically and team-wise.There has to be some kind of pulse or beat, which wasn't fulfilled until...]


[The band couldn't even play together before Piper brought Ed over. Ed is something of a percussion genius, a talent that he's gained from his mother and worked on in his own time. In many areas of music, such as orchestra or band, percussion tends to be made fun of, but as shown in this book, they truly are important. In a sense, they are the foundation for a band, keeping it together.]


[Throughout the whole story Piper is trying to find her herself and change the things that she thinks need to be done in order to complete her own self. Whether or not it was taking up the challenge of music or getting into music itself, there are many opportunities for Piper to just leave and stay as she's always been.]


[As with every story that I like to read, there is an underlying theme of friendship. These main characters do not all start off well with each other, but by the end they have all gained a better understanding of the others. They proved to not only be able to form together as a band, but as people too.

Five Flavors of Dumb

     In starting the year, I actually had wanted to read this book first. Five Flavors of Dumb by Antony John is a book about a mostly deaf girl who starts managing a rock band. Not only did it have a unique plot, but the writing style appealed to me. It seemed very humorous, in the sarcastic kind of way that I like. It's proved to be quite a good novel, going pretty deep into the weaknesses of people. It's most definitely a novel that would be called "coming of age" in the sense that while it's technically about the main character trying to manage a rock band, it's really more about her and the other characters in trying to find themselves in their last year of high school.
     The main character's name is Piper. Piper wasn't born deaf, but it wasn't a surprise when her hearing steadily got worse. Both of her maternal grandparents were deaf, and it quite obviously had to go down the genetic line at some point. Her parents are very insecure about this issue and, as most people would, find it to be quite devastating. Her father seemed to completely reject everything about it and refused to learn sign language. Piper uses a hearing aide and can read lips. That's how she ends up getting by, but it doesn't work all the time, especially since the hearing aides only sort of work in a quiet space. This leads us to the next issue of the story, that her little sister was born deaf, but they spent money to let her hear. Their family isn't all that rich though, so they delved into Piper's college funds, that her grandparents had saved for her. Honestly, this was a betrayal to them, considering that they were not ashamed of being deaf, and the idea of using all the money to "fix" someone, would've been both an insult and a disappointment to them.
     That only slightly goes into the idea of how we perceive weakness. In general, people will feel sorry for the deaf or the blind, but in all reality, is it really that bad? Just because Piper is deaf, doesn't mean that she's missing out of life. Sure, she can't hear, and it can be awkward talking to people, but all in all, she has dreams that she wants to fulfill and a life that she can live out. I know that I've started the blog on quite the late time, but I hope to properly show the issues that have come form this story of a deaf girl, breaking the boundaries and taking life into her own hands through the most beautiful thing that she can't hear, music.