Grizzly Lake

Grizzly Lake features a seventh grade graduate trying to enjoy summer in Portland, OR, except there’s one problem: Bobby, the main character, is plagued by boredom and worry. It’s already three weeks into the summer, and times can’t get any slower. Having a family business of building furniture, he spends his day by a rusty button press. While he feels he’s just letting his summer slip away, Bobby is crushed with worry of being called a ‘retard.’ Bobby is barely passing the seventh grade, his father pressuring about his future and his grades. When he’s given a chance to escape this repetitive cycle, he jumps on it. Best friend, Mike, tells him all about a YMCA summer camp. The camp is called Grizzly Lake and is located at Spirit Lake, Mount St. Helens. The camp is much more jam-packed than back home. Filled with rowdy kids, boating, fights, hiking trails, sky gazing, and meeting the great Harry R. Truman, it makes Bobby realize how flawed his values are and how lost he really is.

Grizzly Lake was definitely an interesting read for me. Living in Portland, OR, it made me realize the true beauty of the scenes around me. I never really thought of my surroundings and what Oregon really has to offer. I just thought about it being the city of roses, which I guess is pretty poetic, but other than that, I didn’t pay much attention. Although the character and I are the same age, I found myself not relating much to the character, except for minor details. I think it was the time difference between how I live and how they did about 46 years past. For all I could tell, sneaking cigarette butts and relighting them and tricking parents weren’t the thing these days. (It’s more like eating chips and playing video games now.) The action scenes felt real, though. I thought Robert Woods did a real good job displaying a character’s personality through raw emotion. Though times changed, I feel like the story is a perfect depiction of life back then.