Monster Summary

Walter Dean Myers’s Monster is an experimental novel written in the form of a film script by its main character, Steve Harmon. Portions of the novel also take the form of a diary kept by Harmon. Harmon is on trial for participating in a robbery and murder. In script mode, the novel alternates between representations of action in the narrative present of Harmon’s murder trial and flashbacks to events that preceded the crime. This alternation between methods of representation heightens tension and facilitates changes in mood from emotional indulgence to strong restraint. The method requires an active and thinking reader, not a passive receptor of information.

As related in the novel, on December 22, two men—most likely Richard “Bobo” Evans and James King—entered a drugstore in Harlem owned by Alguinaldo Nesbitt. José Delgado was assistant to Mr. Nesbitt, but Delgado was not present at the time of the crime. Flashbacks reveal that Steve Harmon, the main character, was present at a conversation about the crime. In flashback, King points out that bank robberies are not advisable because “the man comes down hard for bank money.” He speculates that a crime against a noncitizen—one with a green card or an illegal immigrant—would not be as harshly prosecuted. Harmon merely listens and does not contribute to these reflections. A heavy woman named Peaches also listens to this conversation; however, she is not later accused as a participant in the crime, although her level of participation seems in all respects equal to Harmon’s.

This and other flashbacks reveal that King, Evans, and Harmon are from the same milieu; however, the flashbacks do not establish Harmon’s complicity in the crime. The story does not offer simple answers to readers, who must draw their own conclusions about the crime and trial. It is possible that Harmon scouted the drugstore for King and Evans or acted as a lookout for them. He may also be innocent.

In one possible reconstruction of the crime, King and Evans enter the drugstore and demand money. Nesbitt is armed. He attempts to guard his property against the two robbers. In the struggle, he loses the gun and is shot by either Evans or King. Lorelle Henry, a retired teacher, identifies King as one of the people present in the store. Her eyewitness testimony is not entirely reliable, however, and is challenged by defense attorneys. A recap of police procedures also inspires significant levels of doubt about the reliability of Henry’s account.

A prisoner’s dilemma underlies these ambiguities. Evans hopes for a lighter sentence, admits his part in the events, and implicates the other two defendants. While Harmon had heard of the crime in the abstract from King, there is no evidence that either Evans or King discussed a role for Harmon in the actual commission of the crime. What is clearly the case is that Nesbitt has been killed and that Evans and King have something to do with the robbery and perhaps also the death of the owner. Whether or to what extent Harmon served as a lookout, who pulled the trigger, and who had sufficient motive are all left unclear.

Diary entries that appear as interludes between court scenes generate compassion for the narrator. He records feelings of resentment, fear, and sadness. He also demonstrates a low self-image as a consequence of the prosecuting attorney’s referring to him as a “monster.” In fact, portions of Harmon’s diary evince a kind of self-rage and indulgences in self-pity on the part of the narrator. Both Steve Harmon, at age sixteen, and Osvaldo Cruz, a fourteen-year-old fellow inmate, are far too young for the environment in which a reader finds them. In fact, Cruz has come to the attention of the police because he has been accused by his girlfriend of having gotten another girl pregnant.

The novel seeks to represent reality by interweaving and integrating disparate discourses into a tapestry that defies logical analysis. One prisoner points out that ascertaining the truth is not the aim of the court; instead, if a crime has been committed, someone must be locked up. What that person says about his or her innocence or guilt is immaterial to the decision of the jury. A reader who sees the U.S. juridicial system as an adversarial process essentially devoted to contests of wit may readily agree.

After representing all the ambiguities and uncertainties of the narrator’s plight, the roving-camera narration records the final statements of all the trial’s attorneys. It does nothing to resolve the ambiguities, which remain very much part of the story. The jury convicts King, but it absolves Harmon of any responsibility for the crime. Harmon and his family are greatly relieved, but when he seeks to hug his attorney in appreciation for the victorious outcome, she turns aside and shuffles papers in preparation for leaving. The trial, it seems, has not bridged the gap between the product of the ghetto, Steve Harmon, and the attorney who lives the life of a suburbanite. Steve concludes rightly that his own attorney is not entirely convinced of his innocence.

Monster is presented in an unusual format: a screenplay interspersed with facsimiles of a handwritten journal. The book is illustrated with photos, court sketches, even fingerprints. It won Myers the first Michael O. Printz Award for literary excellence in young-adult fiction.

The fictional author of this screenplay-journal is sixteen-year-old Steve Harmon. He has been accused of acting as a lookout during a homicide. If he is convicted, he could spend the rest of his life in prison. The book describes his weeks of incarceration, his trial, and its outcome. Steve writes in the screenplay format because he wants to become a filmmaker, and because it is a way to distance or disassociate himself from the unfolding nightmare of his life. He can see himself and others as simply actors in a movie.

As the book opens, Steve has already learned that the best time to cry in jail is at night. When other prisoners are screaming and yelling, a little sniffle cannot be heard. He realizes that he must not show weakness in jail, just as he could not show weakness on the street. When he looks in the small scratched mirror over the steel sink in his cell, he does not recognize himself. He starts to wonder if he is becoming some kind of evil changeling. Within the first page of the book, Myers characteristically creates a clear picture of Steve and his predicament. Myers grabs the reader’s attention immediately by using the first-person viewpoint to express the character’s emotions and by describing in sharp physical detail a harsh, disturbing setting.

The prosecutor calls Steve a monster during opening arguments. Steve begins to wonder obsessively if he is a good person or a monster after all. What constitutes a good person? In Steve’s milieu, drug use, petty crimes, and running the streets are just a part of life. His alleged presence during the robbery-homicide raises questions about his choices. Just as his survival in prison depends on displaying a hardened exterior, so his survival on the streets depended on doing little jobs for gang leaders.

Steve insists in his journal that “he didn’t do nothing.” However, his defense lawyer, Ms. O’Brien, has some concerns. She is afraid that the jury will not “see a difference between [him] and all the bad guys taking the stand,” that Steve might be tarred with the same brush as his fellow defendants. Steve intuits that Ms. O’Brien thinks he is guilty and is merely doing her job in the courtroom. Myers does not state the facts of the crime in the book, so the reader is left wondering if Steve was or was not a lookout at the crime scene. This question is literally illustrated by two captioned photos in the book. They both appear to be stills from a store’s videotape, showing Steve in the store. The captions read: “What was I doing?” and “What was I thinking?” It is not clear if the photos are anxious figments of Steve’s imagination or tell-tale hints that he was actually in that store.

Finally, Steve is found not guilty. He spontaneously reaches out to hug Ms. O’Brien, who turns away stiffly, indicating that there is something bad about Steve despite his acquittal. Monster is thoroughly ambiguous about Steve’s role in the crime. It is ambiguous about Steve’s basic nature, his goodness or badness. The book leaves the reader to ponder about whether guilt equals goodness and whether acquittal equals innocence.