Zap by Paul Fleischman

Zap

During the summer I read “Zap” by Paul Fleischman. When I first started the book I was confused until I realized that it was a play. However, this wasn’t an ordinary play, it was a play that was in the audience’s control and each audience had their own remote control. Whenever they pressed the “zap” button it made a sound, and when there is more that 5 sounds the play changes to a different play. In fact, it’s very similar to watching TV.

There are seven different plays, The English Mystery, The Comedy, The Russian Play, Shakespeare’s Richard III, The Performance Art Monologue, The Avant-Gardes Play, and The Southern Play. The English Mystery Play was about nine friends hanging out and having a good time. However, slowly, one by one, those people get murdered by a mystery killer. They continued to keep accusing one person until they died, and then the next, and so on. The Comedy is about a man named Irv Weinstein that tries to get back at the guy that published a book on his life. His friend Sammy helped him by giving him dating advice so he could make the guy’s wife leave him. Sooner or later, the plan works but has a little problem; the guy’s wife wants to move in with Irv. The Russian Play is about a man named Nikolai and his wife Irina moving into a new home. Nikolai picked it so he can learn to live like his ancestors, grow their own food and farm his own field etc. Shakespeare’s Richard III is about a king named Richard III who later on gets married to Lady Anne. The Performance Art Monologue is about a lady named Marsha who talks to the audience about the plays. She gives her opinion on the plays and some times talks about how weird the actors are. The Avant-Gardes Play is about a man and a woman in a hotel room with dead people on the floor. They don’t seem to mind it, the man was focused more on the brochure and the lady seems to be more focused on her crossword puzzle. They don’t talk too much about the corpse; or about anything at all. And lastly, The Southern Play is about a man named Aaron who wants to move north of Catfish Crossing, Mississippi to continue doing what he loves, being an artist. However, his father will not let him go, nor will his sister. On the other hand, when Aaron finally convinces his dad to let him go, he misses the train, every time.

Overall, I think Zap was a good book, it was funny and entertaining. In fact, I felt like it was me controlling the plays because every time I got bored it went to a more interesting play. For example, when they had Shakespeare Richard III playing, I wanted to stop reading, but then the audience changed the play. Although the book was good, it was also confusing because I never got the ending to each play, the audiences would always change it making me miss some of the play. In addition, I thought that when a play just came back on, I didn’t know what they were talking about, they would be talking about something different than before. All in all, the book was good and made me feel like I was watching TV.