S CHRONICLE April 7, 2000

evening'sout

Story of saving the world began with a burning car

by Rachel Gold

Catherine Ryan Hyde's new novel Pay it Forward, about a young boy who sets out to save the world, sold as a movie days before it sold as a novel. The film is scheduled for a fall release, but the book appeared in stores last month.

Pay it Forward is an extraordinary story of 12-year-old Trevor McKinney, who takes on an extra-credit assignment to please a gentle social studies teacher deeply scarred from Vietnam. His plan is to do a good deed for three other people and ask them to "pay it forward" to three others, instead of paying him back. But he meets with seemingly insurmountable setbacks. When he perseveres, paying it forward begins to catch on in spite of or perhaps because of the weakness of human nature.

Hyde's story includes a spectacular diversity of characters. Different races, belief systems, and sexual orientations intermingle. The powerful ending blossoms out of a gaybashing incident.

Hyde first had the idea of paying forward after her car caught fire on the freeway 20 years ago. She worked as an in-home dog trainer at the time, and drove many miles a

Wanna Buy a Home?

day. When she pulled off the exit ramp and her engine died, she stepped out of the car to find two men running toward her with a blanket. They opened the hood, exposing flames, and quickly smothered the fire. Hyde realized they could all have been killed.

Another person arrived to call for help, and the two strangers left before Hyde could thank them. She decided that if she couldn't pay them back for their generosity in risking their lives to save her and the car, she would instead pay it forward to other people.

ATHE

RYAN HYDE

In her novel, Trevor takes on three "pay it forward" projects, none as life-threatening as a burning car. Hyde emphasizes that the size of the good deed doesn't matter, what can seem small to one person is

Need to Refinance?

Troubled credit?... We can help.

216-447-0900 or 800-922-0966

NATIONS CREDIT

A NationsBank Company

NationsCredit Financial Services Corporation

6901 Rockside Road, Independence, Ohio 44131

CASUAL DINING

M

Full BAR Live Music Retail SMOKE FREE

{Ń DOZURILO

FRIDAYS

D 8 pm 12 md

Cafe

Tandoor

Award Winning

Indian Cuisine

the Wine Room

2317 Lee Rd.

216-932-3170

William Craft Branch Sales Manager

Jesse C. Peters Jr. Mortgage Loan Processor

SATURN of Chagrin

Let family take care of your automotive needs! From a large selection of new and used vehicles...

an enormous help to others.

This writer recently talked with Hyde about her novel.

Rachel Gold: You've had the idea of "paying it forward" for about 20 years, why did it take you so long to write the novel?

Catherine Ryan Hyde: The first ten years of that 20 years, I had to get serious about being a writer. There's a huge chasm between wanting to be a writer and deciding that you will be a writer and do everything involved to make that a reality. About nine years ago I set out to seriously be a writer. I still had this idea in my head but I kept writing other novels first, because the execution of it was so complicated or seemed so to me. I wasn't sure how I was going to show all that interconnectedness. I wasn't sure how I was going to put forth such a utopian idea without coming out sounding like a Hallmark card. I guess when the time was right, it was right.

You've actually tried the idea of paying it forward with other people, how did it go?

I don't really know, because one of the wonderful things about paying forward is you just put it out there and people don't have to come back to you and report their results. You don't always know what they went on to do. I do know that people seem to get fired up about the idea; the idea seems to spark something in people.

It's important to stress-if people are going to try this paying forward idea in real life-that you do just put it out there and you don't really know what the results are going to be.

Do you think of your novel as a realistic book?

In many ways. I was searching for a little bit of a magic realism quality. I realize what happens at the end is a larger than life and I meant that, I wanted it to be set in a world that was very much our real world—I didn't want the plot to be weaving through something that felt like fantasy. But I kind of wanted the ending to take on a magical quality. So I would have to say it has elements of both.

Have you talked to a lot of people who have read the book who are taking up the idea in their lives?

Yes, a surprising number [before the release date of the book]. Even as early as when booksellers started getting their advance readers' copy, I started getting feedback.

It seems like a very heartfelt book. Was it frightening for you to write something that emotional and optimistic and put it out there?

People are saying now how courageous it is to write something so wildly optimistic. I didn't exactly realize that's what I was doing. I thought that I was just putting it out as an idea. I was just putting out this story and maybe it would make people think.

I didn't sit down to say: I'm going to write this, and people will do it. I thought it could be a nice little book people could read. I didn't realize it was going to be approached as a social movement. If I had I probably would have been petrified. But fortunately we find out these things as we go.

How did you respond when Warner Brothers bought the rights and began developing the movie?

I was very surprised. There was a lot of stuff going on at the time. Right around the time Warner picked up the movie rights, Hollywood had been buzzing about it for a week or two and my agent started getting calls from publishers whom we had never contacted about the book, saying "We want to see this too."

You've said that you like “edgy, downand-out individuals who still shine with the light of humanity." What attracts you to that?

Part of it is just that, as a fiction writer, I have a lot of respect for problematical characters, for marginalized characters, because you know how they always say, without conflict, you have no story. A character with a lot of emotional flaws makes for much better fiction, as far as I'm concerned.

Also, on a personal level, I have a very deep respect for emotionally troubled people and emotionally handicapped people, because I think they're so much more courageous than the people that we like to think of as normal. Every day, they go out into the world and they're trying to overcome so much and they're holding up so much, and I see a lot of courage in that situation, and I don't see enough people applauding it. ✔

Rachel Gold is a freelance writer living in Minneapolis.

Susan M. Weaver

Attorney at Law

•

Bankruptcy Estate Planning

•

•

DUI

2096 S. Taylor Cleveland Hts. 216-371-8500

CLEVELAND'S #1

RESOURCE CENTER FOR NATURAL HEALTH

дода

experienes

the nerft

FREE YOGA & MEDITATION CLASSES CALL TO REGISTER ALL LEVELS OF YOGA, POWER YOGA, YOGA FOR KIDS, PRENATAL YOGA & MEDITATION

ATMA CENT

2319 Lee Rd

Cleveland Hts

216-371-9760

Come see the new larger Saturn-The LS!

Alison King Saturn of Chagrin

27100 Chagrin Blvd.

Located at Chagrin and I-271 Orange Village, Ohio

(216) 765-1000 ext 128 aking@Glavic.com

"Personalized Solutions

for all Legal Matters"

Free Initial Consultation

Please make a note of our new number (216) 523-8300 Offices in Cleveland & Lakewood

NICHOLAS JEWELERS, INC.

•

Fine Jewelry Diamonds Unique Giftware Commitment Rings • Watch & Jewelry repair

We buy unwanted

Jewelry

(216) 381-3075

At Cedar & Green

Nicholas & Gary Grunwald, Proprietors

2161 S. Green Road, University Heights, Ohio 44121