Tight

Tight

Torrey Maldonado

            Bryan loves superhero comics and he loves to play arcade games – every time he plays Ms. Pac Man he gets the high score. He also lives with his family in a housing project in Brooklyn, and life isn’t always easy.  His dad is in and out of jail – he just can’t seem to control his temper enough to keep out of trouble.  When he’s home, he spends much of his time hanging out at the bodega and telling Bryan he can’t be soft.  But Bryan has never been one to get into trouble, even though he sometimes feel his temper rising, the same way it does for his dad.  He spends his time in his mother’s office at the community center, drawing and reading his comics.  Until one day when Mike comes by and both of Bryan’s parents encourage them to be friends. Mike seems cool at first – he too loves comics and drawing – but he also runs hot and cold.  And he starts encouraging Bryan to do increasingly dangerous things – skip school, run through the turnstiles at the subway without paying, and subway surfing.  Bryan hates doing these things, but he’s in over his head and he doesn’t know how he’s going to get out.

            For the most part, I enjoyed Tight.  Bryan is Puerto Rican, but that doesn’t play heavily into the story.  I think the dilemmas Bryan faces are realistic for a kid his age (he’s in the sixth grade), as well are the emotions he deals with when his father goes back to jail.  My main issue with the book was the abrupt ending – I think that adding a few more pages would have left me feeling much more satisfied.