What would you do if you had only a year to live? Well, whatever you would consider doing; just be sure to not waste your time on Deadline by Chris Crutcher.



The main character, Ben, was a complete bore. He was told that he had only one year to live, and what did he want to do? He wanted to lose his virginity and join the football team. How cliché! And what was even worse was that everything went so well for him and he did not really seem to want to take any risks with his last year of life. Also, it went into depth about every football game Ben played, as if readers would actually care.


Something else that really bothered me was the whole plot of the novel. Nothing really exciting even happened and the story was a bit flat. Once something noteworthy happened, it was overshadowed by Ben stating that he had less than a year to live, and also by repetitive dreams with Hey-Soos.


I did, however, enjoy the town drunk, Rudy. He added a very interesting element to the otherwise tedious story. I probably would not have been able to get through the book had it not been for him. With Rudy, Crutcher gave readers an example of a troubled life and a very memorable character.


Ultimately, the book was pretty much appalling, with the exception of Rudy. Crutcher should have written about Rudy rather than Ben if he was hoping for people to really enjoy his writing.