Bad Boys By Walter Dean Myers (1-48)

Summary:  Bad Boys by Walter Dean Myers is an autobiography of the life of the infamous Walter Dean Myers. In the begining chapers of the book Walter takes us on a tour of his life growing up. He was born in Martinsburg,West Virginia on August 12,1937. Unfortunately, he had lost his mother at a very young age, she had died soon after his little sister was born. Walter had lived with his biological father for quite sometime, but then he had moved in with his sisters mother and her husband. He had moved to New York, which is what he referred to as his first real home and enjoyed the scenary and the music that welcomed him as he settled in. Walter was strangley very close to his "mother" even though he had no relation to her what so ever, except the fact that she was the mother of her sisters. He often stayed by her side and had very interesting and long conversations with her; since he was the youngest of the group he got a lot of attention and spent alot of time with his mother. She would often travel with him to work, but once she started working her day job she hired a babysitter for him, but that didnt keep affect the relationship at all. However, Walter had gotten himself in trouble one day and his mother felt that she needed someone to watch him full time, so he went to go stay with his adoptive fathers sister. There he told many stories about how he would play outside with "the boys" and pick on little Jewish boys because they knew that they wouldnt fight them back. Walter was a very violent boy growing up; only in the first grade and he had knocked a boy out for laughing at him because he spilled glue on his pants. He was also made fun of becasue of his speech impedement, he would often studder on words and kids would say "Dabba, Dabba" whenever he studdered. Walter was a very good student though, he read on a second grade reading level, but wasnt good with talking. The only thing holding him back from good grades was the violent rages that he would cause. At the time, his father had been recruited to the army, whichwas probably one of the reasons he was so angry. His sisters were growing up even more, with one getting married and he wasnt as close to his mother as he was when he was little. Although he was very violent, deep down Walter was a good kid and needed a little bit more attention and hopefully got it before he did or does something that he will regret.


Quote: "what life was about for me in those early years was being with the women i was learning to call Mama" ( Myers 8)
This quote really caught my eye because i was surprised at the fact that his father had let him go with a complete stranger. I dont think that it was fair to Walter, becasue he didnt even know who this lady was and suddenly he had to replace his mother with a complete stranger. His father was tragically left with seven children to raise by himself, but he shouldnt just let each go one by one. My main concern about this decision was why he picked Walter? I was also curious about how this affected him mentally, maybe he was bad becasue his father didnt want him, his mother sent him to his aunt and he was all alone by himself.

Reaction: My reaction to the novel so far is that it is amazing.Walter Dean Myers has a way of telling a story and making you want to read more about the main character. But since this is an autobiography its even more interesting becasue hes letting us into his life and showing us how he grew up and they things that he did when he was little. He's giving us intersting, sad and funny details about his lifestyle and the different things that he did. We get to see his amazing writing style and walk a day or a couple chapters in his shoes and see how he became The Walter Dean Myers.