The Porcupine of Truth Read online

  So I listen. I listen for the thoughts-tripping-over-thoughts that is and always has been me. My brain that never shuts up.

  And for once, that noise in my head is gone. I am lying in a basement in Billings, Montana, with my best friend asleep near me. My parents upstairs. My new grandfather too. I can hear my thoughts. They have slowed not to a crawl, but to a mere jog, and they aren’t tripping all over each other.

  For once, I am quiet. Actually quiet. Which is different than not saying anything.

  I remember something Aisha said to me on our never-ending drive across Utah. She said that during meditation, the leader said that when she started to pray for the first time, she was told that the basic prayer is one word: Thanks.

  So I close my eyes and I say it. Not out loud, because I don’t want to get into a whole big thing about it. Just in my head. I’m not sure who I’m saying it to. I’m not 100 percent sure it matters.

  Thanks, I say. Thanks.

  SOME OF THE material used in Russ’s journals, most notably the puns found on pages 94–95 and 166, come courtesy of my father, Bob Konigsberg, who has been a professional punster for more than seventy years. His version of “Three Sightless Rodents” was sung to me as a child, and he is not sure if he made it up as a child, or if he heard it elsewhere. It is my great joy that these puns will be forever commemorated in this novel. Love you, Dad.

  AS ALWAYS, I want to thank first and foremost my husband, Chuck Cahoy, who puts up with my frequent bouts of writer’s brain. I am the luckiest. Thanks also to my family: my mother, Shelley Doctors; my father, Bob Konigsberg; my sister, Pam Yoss; and my brother, Dan Konigsberg. You love me as I am, and I love you back as you are. To my editor, Cheryl Klein, whose reserved Midwestern sense matches perfectly with my New York “I never met an emotion I didn’t need to express” sensibility. This book would be in tatters without you. To Arthur Levine, for his support, kindness, and wisdom; the amazing team at Scholastic, especially Sheila Marie Everett, Antonio Gonzalez, Lizette Serrano, Bess Braswell, Annette Hughes, Emily Heddleson, and Tracy van Straaten. You are a dream team and I deeply appreciate your hard work and support. To my agent, Linda Epstein, who believed in me when I was faltering in that belief; Jennifer DiChiara, whose expertise is priceless to me; my dear friend Debbie Schenk, who played Aisha to my Carson on an epic research road trip; Richard Fitzgerald and Jeff Haliczer, my couchsurfing hosts, who put us up and helped me understand what it means to surf couches; Michael Abracham, my friend and San Francisco connection; the Piper Center for Creative Writing at Arizona State University; the writer friends who have been so helpful during this process, especially Brent Hartinger, Lisa McMann, Kriste Peoples, Lou Ceci, and Joey Avalos. Thank you all for your honest feedback. To early readers of Porcupine who gave me so much to think about, especially Kameron Martinez, Annika Browne, Alexis Redden, Adam Huss, Brandi Stewart, Evan Walsh, Emily Lesnick, Cathy Bonnell, and Alex Corey. You guys all changed this book for the better. To the authors/friends who amaze me with their words and inspire me to be a better writer, David Levithan, Alex London, Aaron Hartzler, A. S. King, Laurie Halse Anderson, Benjamin Alire Saenz, Jewell Parker-Rhodes, Tom Leveen, Andrew Smith, Daphne Benedis-Grab, Elizabeth Eulberg, and Martin Wilson, among others; Jeff Baranczyk for his hipster café suggestion; Eric Gaspar for his car repair expertise; and never least, to my fans, young and old, who interact with these characters I create and bring them to life. I love you and I appreciate you. Without you, these books would not exist.

  BILL KONIGSBERG is the author of Openly Straight, which was named to the YALSA Best Fiction for Young Adults list and won the Sid Fleischman Award for Humor, and Out of the Pocket, which won the Lambda Literary Award. When Bill traveled the same route Carson and Aisha take here, he learned that “No Exit Next 100 Miles” means “Pee now. No, really. Now.”

  Bill lives in Chandler, Arizona, with his husband, Chuck, and their Labradoodles of Truth, Mabel and Buford. Please visit his website at www.billkonigsberg.com or follow him at @billkonigsberg.

  Text copyright © 2015 by Bill Konigsberg

  All rights reserved. Published by Arthur A. Levine Books, an imprint of Scholastic Inc., Publishers since 1920. SCHOLASTIC and the LANTERN LOGO are trademarks and/or registered trademarks of Scholastic Inc.

  The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

  This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Konigsberg, Bill, author.

  The porcupine of truth / Bill Konigsberg. — First edition.

  pages cm

  Summary: Seventeen-year-old Carson Smith is bored of Billings, Montana, and resentful that he has to help his mother take care of his father, a dying alcoholic whom he has not seen in fourteen years — but then he meets Aisha, a beautiful African American girl who has run away from her own difficult family, and together they embark on a journey of discovery that may help them both come to terms with their lives.

  ISBN 978-0-545-64893-6 (alk. paper) 1. Dysfunctional families — Juvenile fiction. 2. Children of alcoholics — Juvenile fiction. 3. African American teenage girls — Juvenile fiction. 4. Friendship — Juvenile fiction. 5. Billings (Mont.) — Juvenile fiction. [1. Family problems — Fiction. 2. Alcoholism — Fiction. 3. African Americans — Fiction. 4. Friendship — Fiction. 5. Billings (Mont.) — Fiction.] I. Title.

  PZ7.K83518Po 2015

  [Fic] — dc23

  2014027136

  First edition, June 2015

  Cover art and design by Nina Goffi

  e-ISBN 978-0-545-64894-3

  All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of the publisher. For information regarding permission, write to Scholastic Inc., Attention: Permissions Department, 557 Broadway, New York, NY 10012.