Hayes, Daniel 1952-

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HAYES, Daniel 1952-

PERSONAL: Born April 17, 1952, in Troy, NY; son of Thomas Robert (a dairy farmer) and Mary (Welch) Hayes. Education: State University of New York at Plattsburgh, B.S., 1973; State University of New York at Albany, M.S., 1982.

ADDRESSES: Home—San Francisco, CA. Agent—Hy Cohen Literary Agency, P.O. Box 43770, Upper Montclair, NJ 07043. E-mail—[email protected].

CAREER: Waterford Central Catholic School, Waterford, NY, English teacher, 1975-84; Troy High School, Troy, NY, English teacher, 1984—; freelance writer.

AWARDS, HONORS: Best Book for Young Adults citation, American Library Association, 1992, for The Trouble with Lemons, 1995, for No Effect, and 1998, for Flyers; Edgar Allan Poe Award nomination for Best Young Adult Novel, Mystery Writers of America, 1997, for Flyers.

WRITINGS:

The Trouble with Lemons, David Godine (New York, NY), 1991.

Eye of the Beholder, David Godine (New York, NY), 1992.

No Effect, David Godine (New York, NY), 1993.

Flyers, Simon & Schuster (New York, NY), 1996.

Kissing You (story collection), Graywolf Press (Minneapolis, MN), 2003.

Contributor to periodicals, including TriQuarterly, Massachusetts Reviews, Los Angeles Times Magazine, Partisan Review, and Salmagundi.

SIDELIGHTS: Inspiration comes to writers from the most unlikely places. For Daniel Hayes, author of popular young-adult fiction such as The Trouble withLemons, The Eye of the Beholder, and No Effect, the muse took the form of slapstick comedy. "There was a point in my youth when I discovered the Three Stooges on television," Hayes once told an interviewer. "Looking back now, I really think they've had an influence on my work, especially in the way many of my male characters interact with each other. . . . My characters Tyler and Lymie from my first three books have a very Stooge-like friendship. They are always bantering and insulting one another, but there is no question they are friends. It's how lots of adolescent males act with each other."

Adolescent male behavior is the territory Hayes has set out to chart. In his series novels about Tyler and Lymie, and in his novel Flyers, featuring fifteen-year-old protagonist Gabe Riley, Hayes examines the loyalties, friendships, and dreams that fuel the engine of adolescence. His novels, more picaresque adventures than linear plot-driven works, employ comedy in large doses and hit close to the bone on issues such as adult hypocrisy, single-parenting, male virtues, and even alcoholism—though Hayes rejects the idea of problem novels. "My books start with characters," he once explained, "and of course if you have real characters you're going to have problems. But I don't write books, like some TV shows, that 'feature' a disease. For me that's putting the cart before the horse." Loosely formed and organic in structure, Hayes's novels are held together more by the energy of characterization and dialogue than by a tightly woven plot.

Hayes grew up outside Troy, New York, on a dairy farm. One of three brothers and two sisters, Hayes was never at a loss for things to do on the farm. At school he was "a good under-achieving student," who focused more on sports and social activities than he did on homework. "I liked sports and outdoor things, but I also loved books. When I had nothing else to do, I would pick up a book. . . . I came to look at books as a great way to escape being out in the country—a great way to travel and experience difference." It was not until he went to college at the State University of New York at Plattsburgh that he even considered writing as a possible career. He was attracted to English literature as a major "because I kind of liked to read and thought, hey, here's a way I can get a degree just by reading books." Hayes took several writing classes in college and was so eager to get out into the world that he finished his studies in three years.

Upon graduation Hayes headed west to try his luck in Hollywood as a screenwriter, but the closest he got to the movie industry was working as an extra in a film. Fed up with the Hollywood scene, he returned to New York state and eventually found a full-time position in a Catholic junior high school teaching English. Earning his masters degree in 1982, Hayes moved on to teaching high school two years later. "The best thing about teaching is that you get to talk about books all day long," Hayes once recalled to CA. "But some of the kids—actually a lot of them—have trouble with the pace of books, especially older novels. They have grown up with the fifteen-second news clip and with MTV and computers. Novels, on the other hand, take time to set up. Kids are resistant to them."

Another fringe benefit to the teaching job was a built-in cast of characters for the stories that he was creating in his spare time. "The books I have liked the most are coming-of-age stories, so when it came time for me to write my own, it was natural that I turned to young adult and juvenile novels," Hayes explained. Slowly the stories coalesced into a novel about a teen boy named Tyler and his buddy, Lymie. Hayes took six years to write and sell his first novel, The Trouble with Lemons. "I was told by editors that kids would never follow a long book like mine. They urged me to keep the mystery aspect front and center; I often left it on the back burner while I had fun with my characters. Other editors urged me to write more of a problem book, but I wanted a palliative to all those sorts of books. I wanted mine to take young readers away, like books did for me when I was a kid and like they still do for me."

The Trouble with Lemons was the first of several titles following the misadventures of asthmatic, insecure Tyler and his best friend, chubby Lymie. The book is, according to Cathi Dunn MacRae in Wilson Library Bulletin, a "mystery imbued with the thoroughly original spirit of its narrator, Tyler." This narrator lets the reader know the score right off: "I'm not even thirteen, and I've already experienced more humiliation than most adults."

Tyler's poor self-image—he sees himself as the family 'lemon' of the title—is the result of childhood asthma that has kept him in delicate health, his inability to deal with other students—and one bully in particular—his feelings of guilt that he is somehow responsible for his parents' separation. Tyler's troubles are compounded by the death of his father in an accident. During a late-night swim in the local quarry with Lymie, Tyler discovers a dead body and also witnesses a car leaving the scene. As Nancy Vasilakis wrote of The Trouble with Lemons in Horn Book, "Self-acceptance, the vagaries of human nature, finding one's niche . . . make up the elements of this fine first novel by a promising author." As Jody McCoy noted in Voice of Youth Advocates, Tyler "may not be a talented movie star like his mother and older brother but he can run and can face the truth when justice demands it." McCoy called The Trouble with Lemons a "satisfying mystery with an engaging central character in a tale that bubbles right along."

Other reviewers also commended The Trouble with Lemons. A Five Owls contributor complimented Hayes on the "best opening chapter in recent memory," and went on to call the book "a first-rate mystery. . . . Instead of solely creating a thriller according to formula, Hayes has taken the time to write a novel with texture and nuance." A Publishers Weekly critic also had high praise for the book, noting that, "As a mystery it is intriguing, but as a novel about introspection and self-acceptance, it is irresistible." The Trouble with Lemons became an American Library Association Best Book and earned Hayes a large readership eager for more adventures featuring Tyler and Lymie.

Hayes's second novel was in part inspired by a magazine article about how young Italian architecture students decided to play a trick on the art world by fabricating a work by famous sculptor Modigliani that was subsequently 'found' and ultimately—to the horror of the pranksters—authenticated by art experts around the world. In Eye of the Beholder Hayes transplants this story to upstate New York and into the hands of Tyler and Lymie. Wakefield, the town where they live, is celebrating the work of a famous local sculptor, Badoglio, and the duo decide to have some fun with the serious adults.

As a Halloween prank, they carve stone heads a la Badoglio and casually throw their handiwork away in the river where the sculptor was reputed to have thrown two of his unrecovered creations. But when the heads are discovered and dubbed genuine by art critics, the boys are faced with a dilemma. "By the time the truth is discovered," noted Horn Book contributor Vasilakis, "the boys have had a few nervous moments and learned a valuable lesson or two about adult pretensions and weaknesses." Lucinda Snyder Whitehurst commented in School Library Journal on Hayes's "episodic and quick pace," noting also Tyler's "fresh, natural voice" and Lymie, who has "more heart than brains." A reviewer for Publishers Weekly concluded, "Readers will delight in these protagonists' sundry predicaments, all of which are resolved with ingenuity and imagination," while a Booklist contributor dubbed Hayes's second novel "downright hilarious." A Voice Literary Supplement reviewer described the book as a "laugh-out-loud sequel."

Hayes decided that with his third novel featuring Tyler and Lymie, No Effect, he wanted "nothing unusual happening," as he explained to Jones. "I wanted this one to be simply a school book with some unrequited love thrown in." Tyler is determined to become a man; in pursuit of this goal he joins the high school wrestling team, though he is only in the eighth grade. He has dreams of grandeur: "I'm being led off the mat. Women are going crazy. Not even girls now. Real women. And not disturbed ones either. Nice, normal women who are beautiful." Tyler falls in love with one such normal woman, but in typical Tyler fashion she is unreachable: the new science teacher, Miss Williams. Complications arise when Tyler finally discovers that the object of Miss Williams's affections is Chuckie, the gardener, who has become something of an older-brother figure for Tyler. "The result," noted a reviewer for the Voice Literary Supplement, "is excruciating. But funny. . . . In fact, Hayes has such a sure touch that he can make thirteen-year-old-boy humor hit your funny bone, even if you're not a thirteen-year-old boy."

Other reviewers also complimented the novel. Susan R. Farber wrote in Voice of Youth Advocates that the events of No Effect, told by a "less talented writer" could have been simply "slapstick" or "trite." Farber noted, however, that "Hayes is a master at imitating teenage dialogue and he smoothly integrates more serious themes without disrupting the flow or appearing didactic." A reviewer in Publishers Weekly applauded the novel, noting that "Hayes masterfully blends humor and heartache," and dubbing the book "perceptive, funny, and above all, believable." Booklist's Ilene Cooper concluded: "Certainly young people—and yes, especially boys—will identify with both longing for the unattainable and getting into something physical to work off all that excess energy. This one's a page-turner, but readers may also have some things to think about after they close the book."

With his 1996 novel Flyers Hayes departs from the world of junior high for the more troubled waters of high school in a book featuring the fifteen-year-old protagonist Gabe Riley. Vanessa Elder, writing in School Library Journal, noted that a "mysterious, supernatural element is always lurking around the corners of this story," and indeed Gabe is a grab-bag of vagaries. He is an ardent filmmaker with a good sense of humor—a must for any Hayes protagonist. He is also the son of a single-father lawyer with a drinking problem. Gabe and his friends are making a movie about ghosts and swamp monsters, but things go awry when the townspeople see the teens dressed in costume and take them for the real thing.

Candace Deisley had high praise for Flyers in Voice of Youth Advocates, calling it a "gem of a young adult novel" that not only deals with issues such as "dating, drinking, driving and peer pressures," but that also blends Hayes's "marvelous humor" to create a "terrific" combination. A reviewer in Publishers Weekly commented that the tale "goes straight from the funnybone to the heart," and that throughout, Hayes's "spry work blends wisecracks with insightful reflections on life, death and relationships."

After taking a break of several years, Hayes returned to publishing in 2003 with a collection of ten short stories titled Kissing You. Focusing on characters with troubled relationships and odd obsessions, the stories capture lonely and often unsatisfied lives. In one story, a man is still haunted by the death of a girl from his high-school days, a girl he only spoke to once. In another story, stalking one's date is presented as a viable alternative to engaging in small talk with her. A casual compliment to a stranger has unexpected consequences in another story, while the title story concerns the first kiss between two gay men who meet in a supermarket. Joanne Wilkinson in Booklist found that Hayes's collection is "challenging reading for serious fiction fans." A critic in Kirkus Reviews found that the stories "explore modern romance and physical intimacy in a variety of styles and approaches."

"I write when I really have something to say," Hayes once noted to an interviewer. "I don't force myself to write to a schedule because then it gets dry, the results aren't good and I throw big chunks of it away. But inspiration is all around. Many of my ideas come from my own childhood, and being around kids all day teaching reminds you that there is really a generic kind of kid-dom that cuts across culture and generations. Fashions may change and language may change, but the elemental kid does not. Kids just blurt it out. They let their feelings out spontaneously. And in the end, kids are amazingly resilient. They are survivors. It's my job as a writer to show this resiliency and to poke some fun at the world in general. I hope my books have an overriding and underlying optimism. The sort of optimism like at the end of a Chaplin film when Charlie gives that little click of the heels at life. Life springs eternal. That's the sort of optimism I'm aiming for at the end of my books; no matter how hard life is there is some hope there."

BIOGRAPHICAL AND CRITICAL SOURCES:

books

Hayes, Daniel, The Trouble with Lemons, David Godine (New York, NY), 1991.

Hayes, Daniel, No Effect, David Godine (New York, NY), 1993.

periodicals

Booklist, March 15, 1992, p. 1364; February 1, 1993, p. 984; May 1, 1994, p. 1595; March 15, 1998, p. 1214; April 1, 2003, Joanne Wilkinson, review of Kissing You.

Bulletin of the Center for Children's Books, June, 1991, p. 237.

Five Owls, January, 1992, p. 64.

Horn Book, July-August, 1991, pp. 462-463; January-February, 1993, p. 91; March, 1994, p. 205; January-February, 1997, Nancy Vasilakis, review of Flyers, p. 56.

Kirkus Reviews, March 15, 1991, p. 393; November 15, 1992, p. 1443; September 1, 1996, pp. 1322-1323; March 15, 2003, review of Kissing You, p. 417.

Kliatt, March, 1995, p. 6.

Publishers Weekly, March 22, 1991, p. 80; November 30, 1992, p. 56; November 22, 1993, p. 64; November 4, 1996, review of Flyers, p. 177.

School Library Journal, June, 1991, p. 125; December, 1992, p. 112; January, 1994, p. 132; November, 1996, p. 120.

Voice Literary Supplement, December, 1993, pp. 26-27.

Voice of Youth Advocates, August, 1991, p. 171; December 1992, p. 21; February, 1994, p. 368; February, 1997, p. 327; April, 1998, p. 42.

Wilson Library Bulletin, December, 1991, pp. 102-103.