ZAP!

Thanks to rebellibrarian for reminding me of ZAP. Since I had read a lot of the nominated QP books already this long weekend, I decided I could take a break and read the new Paul Fleischman. So, the concept of the book is that there are 7 different plays that are being performed in the theater, and the audience gets remote controls that they can click when any one of the plays gets too boring (hence the ZAP title). What happens, then, is that the scene shifts from southern play to Russian play to dramatic monolog ue by a performance artist to comedy to Richard III--you get the idea. I am always on the hunt for books for gifted readers, and this one fits the bill. Multiple stories, multiple approaches, a large cast of characters, and lots of fun when things break down both on and off the stage. Fleischman is an incredibly versatile artist who seems to move between and among genres and formats with amazing ease. ZAP will not take long to read, but would be better served by performance in the classroom over a period of weeks as almost a choral type read aloud?