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    Full Service
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    Full Service
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    Full Service
    Ebook210 pages2 hours

    Full Service

    By Will Weaver

    4/5

    ()

    Currently unavailable

    Currently unavailable

    About this ebook

    The times they are a-changin' . . .

    The summer that Paul turns sixteen his mother pushes him to take a job in town instead of just working on the family farm. "You need to meet the public," she says, which is saying a lot for a woman deeply committed to the tightly knit religious community to which they belong. And meet the public Paul does: He meets Kirk, the angry gas station manager; Harry, a reclusive and kindly gangster; and a family of hippies passing in a yellow peace van to San Francisco. He also meets beautiful Peggy, a high school sensation, and dark-haired Dale, her onthe-side boyfriend who is headed to Vietnam. All of them come to the station – as well as girls on summer vacation, tanned and smelling of coconut oil, and ministers from Paul's fundamentalist church, who are worried about his soul. As the summer progresses, Paul learns the secrets of his small Minnesota town and discovers that he's ready to have a few secrets of his own.

    With richly developed characters and a flair for arresting imagery, Will Weaver tells the story of the end of one boy's innocence, unfolding at a time when the country as a whole is undergoing a difficult, deeply disturbing coming-of-age.

    LanguageEnglish
    PublisherMacmillan Publishers
    Release dateSep 2, 2008
    ISBN9781429934282
    Unavailable
    Full Service
    Author

    Will Weaver

    Will Weaver is an award-winning fiction writer. His latest novel is The Survivors, a sequel to his popular young adult novel Memory Boy. His other books include Full Service, Defect, Saturday Night Dirt, Super Stock Rookie, Checkered Flag Cheater, Claws, and the Billy Baggs books Striking Out, Farm Team, and Hard Ball, all of which are ALA Best Books for Young Adults. Formerly an English professor at Bemidji State University, he lives in northern Minnesota, a region he writes from and loves. He is an avid outdoorsman and enjoys hunting, fishing, canoeing, and hiking with his family and friends.

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    Reviews for Full Service

    4/5

    30 ratings4 reviews

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    • 5/5
      Wow, I am so sorry this title sat on my "to read" list for so long. But what a treat to experience it at last. This coming-of-age-in-the-1960s story is funny, evocative, has the most memorable characters, and is hands down one of the most well-written YAs I've read. Nothing extraneous here; every word, every scene counts.

      In the summer of 1965, the world is on the verge of change and so is
      16-year-old Paul Sutton, a farm boy and fundamentalist Christian. His
      mother encourages him to get a summer job in town and "meet the public" although his father disagrees; Paul is needed on the farm. Paul gets a job at the Shell gas station and there meets more different kinds of "the public" than he ever knew before: Kirk, his co-worker who has affairs with various women in town; Harry Blomenfeld, a former Chicago gangster; a hippie family in a broken down van; high school hotties Dale and Peggy; and assorted tourists and pretty girls. Funny novel; characters pop off the pages; fluid descriptive prose that just absorbed me.
    • 5/5
      I am not ordinarily a boy coming of age story kind of person, and especially when they are combined with historical fiction, then usually I will go running. But this book was unusually poignant and well-written – I really liked it. This is a different sort of book for Will Weaver – his books are usually sports and cars oriented. This book is about Paul Sutton, who is turning 16 in 1960’s Minnesota. His family belongs to an unnamed religious group, and he has been labeled that way his whole life. This summer his mother decides that he should go work in their small town, and he gets a job pumping gas at the local gas station. This brings him into contact with “the public” – an amazing group of characters of all ages who are distinct and interesting. The book talks about faith, religion and all of the things going on in the mid-60’s, including the draft for Vietnam. Paul discovers love, loyalty, friendship and respect throughout the long summer, but the book is so well-written, it seems like just one week. There are many dramatic moments in this book, such as the moment when Paul could potentially accept his faith. There are a family of hippies that live on Paul’s farm that summer which really stand out – a good story for sure.
    • 3/5
      I kind of liked this book because it was in the olden days during the time of the Vietnam war. I also liked the fact that they told him that there was such thing as a Mr. Shell and then they told him there wasn't no such thing, but at the end he shoes up. Except the fact he didn't know that it was him, the he got a letter from Mr. Shell. My favorite characters were the hippies because i think they're funny, because of their names. Also because the way they talk, but especially because the hippie van with the big O' Peace sign.
    • 4/5
      Paul lives on a farm in rural Wisconsin. Life is pretty simple for Paul—follow God’s law, help others, work on the farm, attend services—until he takes a job in town. Beer, drugs, and sex add layer upon layer of complications to his life. When a hippie family with a teenaged daughter move in with his family, Paul’s simple moral code is severely tested. Set against the backdrop of the Vietnam conflict and the “free love” generation, Paul both questions and discovers the values and limitations of family and tradition. Weaver tells a story that is surprisingly heart-warming even with steamy parts that will hook most teen readers.