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I Am the Cheese | Introduction

I Am the Cheese, published in 1977, was Robert Cormier's second young adult novel. It tells the story of a teenaged boy who discovers that his family is part of a witness protection program and that his parents have been keeping secrets from him all his life. As he tries to determine who and what he is, he is threatened and finally overcome by the terrifying forces of a government that is more interested in preserving its own power than in protecting one small boy. The idea for the book grew out of Cormier's reading a magazine article about the then-new federal witness protection program and his fascination with the idea of individuals struggling against an unjust society.

The book has sold consistently well since its publication, but it has also attracted controversy. Some have felt that the book's complicated structure and pessimistic ending are inappropriate for young people, and the novel has occasionally been challenged and banned in school libraries. Nonetheless, it has been recognized for excellence by several influential organizations, including the American Library Association and the Children's Literature Association. It was named an Outstanding Book of the Year by the New York Times and a Best Book of the Year by School Library Journal, among other recognitions.

I Am the Cheese Summary

Chapter 1
I Am the Cheese opens with the words "I am riding the bicycle and I am on Route 31." These words are important for several reasons: they introduce the novel's protagonist, they establish the first-person point of view and present tense that will characterize one strand of the novel, and they begin a paragraph that will be repeated later in the novel. In this first chapter, one of fifteen in the present tense, the narrator is a teenage boy riding an old bicycle from Monument, Massachusetts, to Rutterburg, Vermont, to bring a securely wrapped gift to his father.

The boy, Adam, appears to have decided on this trip rather abruptly: he did not tell anyone at home or at school that he was leaving, he did not call “Amy,” and he did not take his pills. He quietly wrapped up his father's gift, grabbed an old cap to keep his ears warm in the October wind, and took his savings of thirty-five dollars and ninety-three cents. Now, as he bikes along, he looks over his shoulder to see whether he is being followed. Only four or five miles into the seventy-mile trip he is getting tired, but a long downhill lets him coast for a while.

Chapter 2
The second chapter begins with code letters (“TAPE OZK001”), followed by a transcript of an interview between “T” and “A.”T identifies himself as Brint, and asks questions to help A remember “that night.” It seems that A is unable to remember anything clearly, although he has been given some sort of medication to relax him or to help him remember. After a few exchanges on the interview tape, the writing shifts to a prose narrative in the past tense, told by a third-person limited narrator with insight into the mind of one character, who appears to be Adam at an earlier time. A young boy, lying in bed with his Pokey the Pig stuffed animal, overhears an urgent whispered conversation between his parents. He realizes they are trying to keep him from hearing. This past-tense narrative is interrupted by another transcription from the tape, as Brint urges Adam to remember exactly what he heard. These three strands—the present-tense sections narrated in the first person by Adam, the present-tense transcripts of interview tapes, and the past-tense memories of Adam presented in the third person—are interwoven throughout the remaining thirty-one chapters of the novel. No strand contains direct references to the others, but characters and plot elements overlap to create a mysterious but unified story in the reader's mind. Perhaps the easiest way to understand how the plot unfolds is to trace each strand separately to the end of the novel.

The Tapes
The sixteen transcriptions of... » Complete I Am the Cheese Summary