Growing Up:

Taking Off the Mask

A Multigenre Journey through Laurie
Halse Andersons 2007 novel Twisted

By Emily Griffin

Dear Reader,
In 2007, Laurie Halse Anderson released a novel that continues to serve as a voice for
thousands of broken adolescents throughout the country. Twisted offers these souls an image of
hope, not just because of the pubescent male perspective, but also because of the intimate
discussion of depression and despair.
Every year, thousands of adolescents make the fatal decision to end their own life the
reasons behind these decisions can vary, but the problem remains the same. Thousands of
humans feel small enough that they believe their existence is not worth their blood and bones.
Thousands of young souls feel a crippling darkness, even when the sun is shining on their
beautiful faces. Thousands of students feel so alone in this world, that despite the other seven
billion humans on this planet, their isolation is so deep that they believe it isnt worth the pain.
Tyler Miller is one of these humans. Hes a rising senior at George Washington High
School, who lives in a quiet suburban home with his mother, father, and younger sister. In his
free time, he likes reading about cars, playing video games on the computer, and thinking about
death.
He reads articles about death a plane crash that killed 32 people did they feel any pain?
Did they watch their life flash before their eyes? Did they finally feel free when they exhaled
their last breath? The cryptic moment of death intrigues Tyler, who often thinks of his own
fatal moment.
Tyler wasnt always so perplexed by this concept, but after growing up in an unhealthy
home for so long, his mind cant help but roam to the idea of being gone. His father, The
Corporate Tool of All Tools, is fixated on work, and only work. His mother, The Excuse Queen,
pretends that everything is okay, as long as she has a gin and tonic in her hand. His sister, The
Boy-Crazed Freshman, is strictly concerned with bellybutton rings, boys who play sports, and
(surprise) being popular. Throw these three into a single household, and youll start to play the
game of Who Can Wear the Mask Better? The Miller Family Edition and there are no
winners.
As a rising senior, Tyler decides that he is fed up with these masks, and he is fed up with
being a zit on the butt of the student body, so he decides to pull a prank at school; except his
rendition of a prank actually turns out to be quite the crime. This event, known to the Millers as
The Foul Deed, lands him a probation officer who only serves as another reason for his dad to
call him a failure. While dad continues to control everybody, Tyler begins to withdraw from
being a part of the perfect family, until something even worse comes crashing down on his
already broken mentality.
The following genres offer you a look into the numbing mindset of Tylers everyday life.
The perfect family that just wont take off the mask and face reality; the criminal narrative of
how The Foul Deed really went down; the desperation for a normal life, the real kind of normal,
without suicidal thoughts and disgruntled parents; the playlist that breaks down the winding ride
from pain to pleasure; and the ironic confliction between growing up and grown. These genres
offer you, my sweet reader, a look into a life that I hope you never have to know.
For those of you that already know this kind of family all too well: hang in there. Hope
springs when you least expect it, but it always springs. To cut your life short before Hope finds
that chance is a choice that will never bring you the peace that you so clearly deserve.
Thanks for reading I pray that you always stay hopeful,
Emily Griffin

The Perfect Family

INGREDIENTS
1/2 Father figure (with a stick up his ass)
1 Mother
1 Bottle of Gin
1 Daughter (ripe with boy frenzy)
1 Son (fresh out of puberty)
Suicidal Thoughts

From the Miller family

Serves approximately 4

6
1
1
4
1
1

Cans of Spray Paint

Probation Officer
Christmas Card (completed with tacky sweaters)
Fake Smiles (no expiration date)
Bucket of Excuses
Beretta Pistol

7. Take the cans of spray paint and commit The Foul Deed.
Make sure you commit this crime in public, so that you get
DIRECTIONS
caught and bring even more shame to the family.
1. First, pour the entire bottle of gin in a bowl, and place
8. After The Foul Deed is done, throw the probation officer
submerge your mother. Let her soak for 3-4 hours.
in with the son. Let them mix together for 6-12 months.
2. Next, take your father figure and throw half of him away.
9. Take the mother out of her gin soak, and place her on a
Youll only need the body, not the soul. Place him in a
baking pan that is lined with tacky Christmas decorations.
separate bowl from the mother.
Pick the daughter up from her cooling rack and set her
3. Then set your daughter to the side, preferably on a
next to the mother. Briefly remove the father from his
cooling rack; she will only complicate things right now.
bowl of stress, and add him to the pan. Finally, add the
Give her time to become cool.
son as well but place him away from everyone else.
4. Place the son into the bowl with the father, and let them
10. Peel the scowl off of each persons face, and replace it with
wreak havoc for at least 2 hours. Make sure the fathers
an incredibly fake smile. Take a picture of the pan and mail it
stick remains up his ass the entire time.
to every person you know, along with a cheesy note.
5. Once the father has torn the son to shreds, sprinkle these
11. Remove the father and place him back in his bowl of stress.
shreds with endless suicidal thoughts. Let this mixture
Leave the mother on the pan with her daughter and son, and
marinate for 3-4 years.
sprinkle the bucket of excuses all over the three of them. Let
6. While the son is marinating, remove the father & place him
this mixture sit for 3-4 years.
in a separate bowl. He will stay here & stress about work
12. Remove the son from this pan and place him back in bowl of
for the remaining steps (minus an appearance in step nine).
shame from step four. Carefully pick up the Beretta pistol,
and add it to the bowl as well. Let the son soak with the gun.
13. Finally, throw everything away, but dont clean up the mess.
Pretend that the mess doesnt bother you, and go on with
your life as if everything is fine.

TH
E
PL
A
YL
IS
T

Growing Up

vs.

Grown

Why cant he see how hard I work in school?

Why cant he see how busy I am with work?

He only thinks of himself.

He wants to control us, but he doesnt even know us.
He wants to slack off, but I wont let him ruin us.

Does he think that this is how you treat family ?

I try, and try, and try, and he still thinks I dont care.
I provide everything for this family, and he still thinks I dont care.

Why cant he see that Im drowning ?

Hes Always asking, What will people think?
Hes always causing problems... What will people think?

Does he even realize what hes doing ?

When is he going to take off that mask?
When is he going to grow up?

I need him to see the damage hes causing

Good dads dont ignore their children.
Good dads dont hit their children.

Why cant he understand that ?

He needs to take off the mask and act like a man.
He needs to grow up for once and act like a man.

Maybe hell realize one day , but itll probably be too late.

Notes
The Perfect Family Recipe
Similar to the recipe cards that might sit in a perfectly organized recipe box within the kitchen of a
perfectly decorated suburban home, The Perfect Family Recipe lists the ingredients and directions needed to
produce the structure of a not-so-perfect family. I included 12 ingredients that were crucial to the dysfunction
that layered Tylers life, as well as step-by-step instructions of how these ingredients can destructively mix into a
severely troubled environment. This destructive mix serves as the world that Tyler has grown up in for so long,
and how this unhealthy development can cause serious damage. While Tylers father, mother, and sister are all
fixated with maintaining a normal reputation at work, school, and among neighborhood gossips, Tyler does not
wish to wear this false mask of happiness. Throughout Twisted, readers begin to see more and more of how
depressed both Tylers father and mother truly are, which comes as no surprise since more than 16 million adults
suffered a major depressive episode in 2015 (CBHSQ). Although these 13 steps are jokingly portrayed as a
messy cuisine, they instead represent the seriously messy steps that have pushed Tyler to the edge of his
depression.

The Foul Deeds Police Report

After reconfiguring the format of an official offense report, I created this piece to briefly describe the
events from The Foul Deed. Throughout Twisted, Tyler references The Foul Deed and how this decision has
drastically changed his life, but readers are only given his perspective of that busy morning. Although we know his
reasoning behind the prank (a.k.a. crime), we do not read much about the unfortunate process that followed. I
modeled this piece to represent the seriousness behind his decisions; the report portrays how this day, and the
subsequent summer months, served as a climax in Tylers transformation from an apathetic teenager into an
almost responsible adult. In the narrative of this report, I cited that Tyler did not wear a mask during his excursion
that morning, and although this is true to the story, I used it to represent more than his delinquency. Tyler chose
to not wear a mask during his criminal behavior because he does not wish to hide who he truly is, errors included.
While his family parades around town as if their world is not crashing and burning around them, Tyler decides to
forgo the mask of lies and act as he truly feels.

The Soundtrack to My Misery: A Twisted Playlist

Keeping it short, I spent far too many hours picking out the top ten most relevant songs for Tylers
soundtrack. The playlist begins with an unlikely artist, but J. Coles explanation of growing up as a fuckin screw
up pairs all too well with Tylers claim: I was good at digging holes. It was the rest of life I sucked at. Smells
Like Teen Spirit introduces the negative tone and love for guns that Tyler regularly displays throughout the novel,
which sets up Radioheads lyrics in the third track: I'm not here / This isn't happening / I'm not here, I'm not here
/ In a little while / I'll be gone / The moment's already passed / Yeah, it's gone. This plea parallels Tylers intense
fixation with death, as he repeatedly says that he doesnt want to commit suicide, but also does not wish to be
living any longer. Before hitting the lighter climax with Come As You Are, by Nirvana, Staind takes the playlist to
a dark level: To my mother, to my father / It's your son or / It's your daughter / Are my screams loud enough for
/ You to hear me, should I turn this up for you / I sit here locked inside my head / Remembering everything you
said / The silence gets us nowhere / Gets us nowhere way too fast. Tylers dysfunctional mentality stems from the
unhealthy marriage between his parents, who are both struggling to deal with their own problems. Stainds lyrics
accurately portray the strained relationship between these family members, and how increasingly problematic their

behavior is becoming. Fortunately, Nirvana acts as the changing point by proclaiming feelings of acceptance with
Come As You Are, which pairs with Tylers sudden decision to take control of his life. The last half of the playlist
reveals a more optimistic perspective, as the songs promote self-love and finding purpose within ones life. While
his familys masks brought damage to his life at the beginning of the story, Tyler remained true to his own
character and continued to grow stronger despite his destructive mentality. This twist in perspective is crucial to
Tylers transformation from boy to man throughout the novel, as he grows to be both physically as well as
mentally strong. For a majority of the novel, Tyler is emotionally unstable when it comes to battling his own
suicidal thoughts, which led to my decision in creating a playlist for his story. Huron (2015) conducted a study to
determine how music can evoke feelings from listeners, and his results showed that, in most cases, learned
associations can influence a persons reaction to certain types of music. Knowing this, I crafted Tylers playlist to
include songs that are all relevant not only to his life, but to my own life as well. This collection of songs evokes
the many feelings that Tyler portrayed throughout his transformation, but most importantly: this collection ends on
a note of perseverance for happiness and acceptance of self.

WANTED: A NORMAL LIFE

This humorous attempt at a wanted poster serves as Tylers plea for just an ounce of normal in his life.
The poster cites many of the issues that continuously raise hell in Tylers world: suicidal thoughts; being labeled
as a criminal (and simultaneously, a bad boy); reading disabilities causing trouble in school; having no one to
turn to, except a boy named Yoda; and knowing that his parents marriage is still in tact only because they had
children. These are daily reminders that Tyler is not normal, even though he knows that some of them are
outside of his control. Regardless, these traits are just some of the reasons that he feels the need to leave
whether that means killing himself, or simply running away. Tylers suicidal behavior is prevalent throughout the
novel, which makes me wonder how well Murrell et al.s (2014) Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) would
have influenced his life. Towards the end of the novel, Tyler does start to display a few of ACTs crucial skills:
acceptance, valuing, and committed action. But growing up, Tyler saw himself as nothing more than an outcast,
and this image only grew with time. While the rest of his family put so much effort into playing a normal family,
Tyler contemplated how to actually become normal, instead of playing the game of false faces. This false-faced
mask leads into the design of this poster, as I purposely used a cheesy stock photo of a typical teenage boy
giving the camera a thumbs-up sign. This overly stereotypical image mirrors the cheesiness behind the concept of
a normal life that Tyler craves so badly. Although Tyler does come from a severely damaged home, the idea of
normal is simply a fixation amongst those who allows themselves to crave it. No one is normal at least not in
the sense that Tyler continuously imagines.

GROWING UP

VS.

GROWN: A TWO-SIDED POEM

This poem is a rendition of the complex similarities and differences that coexist between the perceptions
of Tyler and his father. Tyler, growing up, and his father, grown, dont see eye-to-eye throughout the novel,
yet they both think the same thoughts when it comes to each other. The middle lines of this poem are used to
represent the similar beliefs that these two share, while the outer lines are the ironic differences that keep them
apart. Tylers effort is regularly ignored, and even overshadowed at times when his criminal record is on the line.
Tylers father puts all of his effort into his work, but he believes that he is a successful father because he never hit
his children, unlike his own father. While Tyler wants to find peace in his destructive world, his father only wishes
to wear the mask of perfection and play the game of life. The two share different definitions when it comes to
successful, and these contrasting points of view are what lead to the explosive scene towards the end of the
novel.

Annotated Bibliography
Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and Quality. (2016). 2015
National Survey on Drug Use and Health: Methodological
summary and definitions. Rockville, MD: Substance Abuse and
Mental Health Services Administration.
A 2015 study by the Center for Behavioral Health Statistics and
Quality (CBHSQ) found that 16.1 million adults aged 18 or older in the
United States had at least one major depressive episode during a single
year. This number represented 6.7% of all U.S. adults. The study
mainly based their definition of a major depressive episode off of the
4th edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental
Disorders (DSM-IV), which states: A period of two weeks or longer
during which there is either depressed mood or loss of interest or
pleasure, and at least four other symptoms that reflect a change in
functioning, such as problems with sleep, eating, energy, concentration,
and self-image. CBHSQs 2015 study only further proved the World
Health Organization (WHO; 2010) claim that major depression carries
the heaviest burden of disability among mental and behavioral
disorders. Although this study does not include the population of
persons aged 17 or younger, the severity of depression within American
communities is clear. Whether the illness affects persons directly or
indirectly, millions of families across the country continue to struggle
with the consequences of depression.
Huron, D. (2015). Affect induction through musical sounds: an
ethological perspective. Philosophical Transactions Of The Royal
Society B: Biological Sciences, 370(1664), 1-7.
doi:10.1098/rstb.2014.0098
Huron uses this study as an exploration into how certain music can
affect human emotions. Musically evoked emotions can be caused by
countless sources, but three of these sources remain major in this
process: a persons innate auditory responses, learned associations, or
mirror neuron processes. Hurons research suggests both conditioned
responses and learned associations may have relationships to the

musical stimulus, meaning that a song that typically evokes happiness

for one listener, can actually evoke sadness in another listener due to an
association with a failed loved one. While some learned associations
are widespread across large populations, many associations are distinct
to individual listeners. Because the immeasurable states of feelings
evoked by signal observation do tend to be individualized, associations
between songs and emotion can be stronger than one initially realizes,
especially when music is produced with a specific intention to induce
emotions from listeners.
Murrell, A. R., Al-Jabari, R., Moyer, D., Novamo, E., & Connally, M.
E. (2014). An acceptance and commitment therapy approach to
adolescent suicide. International Journal Of Behavioral
Consultation & Therapy, 9(3), 41-46.
In 2013, more than 4,600 American adolescents felt the need to
take their own life. Although this number seems small compared to the
hundreds of thousands of adolescents who chose to live, the web of
lives that are perpetually effected by these 4,600 deaths is
insurmountable. As if this horror wasnt tragic enough already, Murrell,
Al-Jabari, Moyer, Novamo, & Connally (2014) report that adolescent
suicides rates continue to rise, every single year. Teens may dabble
with the thought of death for a vast array of reasons, but the stats
remain the same: suicidal behavior is taking over adolescents in
America. Despite this wave of death, Murrell et al. (2014) found that
Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) is a crucial step in
preventing and intervening within adolescent suicide. ACTs main
goal is to increase psychological flexibility through verbal human
contact. Adolescents undergoing ACT should eventually acquire six
core processes that promote continued psychological flexibility:
acceptance, defusion, contact with the present moment, self-as-context,
valuing, and committed action. Together, these skills can provide
adolescents with the strength to overcome any thoughts of suicidal
behavior.