The Paperboy by Pete Dexter

Why I Picked The Paperboy to Read

My mom gave me The Paperboy by Pete Dexter. I think she bought it before the movie came out and read it on one of her trips to visit me. She likes to leave books for me to read. I picked this book to take to Thailand because it is small and light enough to fit in my carry on. I also wouldn’t have been too upset if I had to leave it somewhere. How do you feel about leaving books in hotels?

Book Stats

• Title: The Paperboy
• Author: Pete Dexter
• Series: N/A
• Genre: Mystery
• Publication Date: 1995
• Pages: 336
• Est. Reading Time: Approx. 10 hours
• My Rating: 3/5 stars
• Buy Now: Amazon

The Paperboy: Plot Summary

Ward James and Yardley Acheman are investigative reporters for the Miami Times. Charlotte Bless promises them the story of a lifetime. She says her fiancé, Hillary Van Wetter, is innocent of the murder of Sheriff Thurmond Call. She wants the reporters to help get him off of death row. Even though Charlotte has never actually met her fiancé and has only communicated with him through letters.

The story mostly follows Jack, Ward’s younger brother, who delivers newspapers for their farther’s Newspaper. When Ward gets a DUI he has to hire Jack to be his driver while he is investigating Charlotte’s case. Not many people are willing to help the reporters and soon there is so much lying and hiding it’s hard to know the truth.

Thoughts

The main thing I hated about this book was that it didn’t have chapters. I love books with short chapters but this one was broken up into short segments. The sections ranged from very short paragraphs, to at most a couple of pages. I found this formatting very distracting. How do you feel about books with no chapters?

There were parts that were boring and at times I wasn’t sure what the point of the story was. It could have been that I had a hard time concentrating without chapters. I also thought the murder mystery would be the main point of the story but it’s more about the Ward family and the newspaper business.

There were enough interesting and exciting parts to keep me reading though. At first, I thought everything wasn’t going to come together in the end.  I was going to be really upset if they didn’t answer all my questions. At the last minute, everything fell into place though. The ending definitely saved it from being a 2 star read for me.

Favorite Quotes

Even though I didn’t love the book, there were still a few quotes I enjoyed and made me think. One is:

“It occurred to me that it didn’t matter that he was no good at this; what mattered was that he was willing to do it. The thing he was good at was born of a lack of talent. He did not need grace to push ahead.”

– Pete Dexter, The Paperboy

Jack thinks this when he and Ward are struggling to get through a very overgrown, swampy road to get to the Van Wetter’s place. Ward kept stumbling and getting whacked in the face by branches. Jack actually thought “No one was more out of place than Ward was here, and yet he pressed through.” It shows Ward’s dedication to being a reporter. He would do whatever it takes to get the real story.

Another quote is:

“It seemed to me then—it has always seemed to me—that there are people whom you recognize intuitively as your enemies. And most of the time, as in the case of Yardley Acheman, they recognize you. And even if nothing is ever said or done, the animus is there from the first moment you walk into the same room.”

– Pete Dexter, The Paperboy

Ward asks Jack why he and Yardley got in a fight and this quote is what Jack was thinking. He answers with “I suppose we are just natural enemies.” I like this quote because I feel like there are a few people who you just don’t like from the start. Sometimes they haven’t done anything to you and you can’t put your finger on why you don’t like them. Most likely it’s your subconscious picking up on a trait that doesn’t fit well with you.

Final Thoughts for The Paperboy

I gave The Paperboy by Pete Dexter 3 stars. Maybe if the format was different I would have enjoyed it more. It was really hard to pick it up again once I put it down. There were a few times I thought about not finishing it but it’s not a long book and I am a completionist so I stuck it out. There were a few interesting characters and a couple of exciting parts that kept me intrigued enough to make it to the end. I’m glad everything was tied together. I would recommend this book to someone who doesn’t like long chapters and likes books that focus on reporters and how they write stories. I wouldn’t mind seeing the movie even though I don’t think it did well. It has a lot of big actors in it, like Matthew McConaughey, Zac Efron, and Nicole Kidman.

Have you read or seen the movie? I would love to hear your thoughts!