Read A Field Guide for Heartbreakers for Free Online Page A

meal.”“If you say so.”“Furthermore, ice cream is a top-choice, guy-getting food,” Veronica said.“Because it involves the tongue?” I asked.“Exactly. Eat it slow. And don’t let your tongue go wild. No need to behave like a dairy-addicted strumpet. Also, if it feels natural, make a couple of mmm-mmm sounds. Guys dig hearing mmm-mmm sounds. It’s very affirming.”This felt like ridiculous advice. And I had never heard her use the word “strumpet” before. “Shouldn’t we be eating healthy foods? Like, what if I’m eating celery?”“You shouldn’t eat that in front of a dude. If you really want to capture a guy’s interest, eat a banana.” “You’re insane,” I said.I reached under the seat in front of me and grabbed the first two workshop stories. They’d been e-mailed to us earlier in the week, but I hadn’t finished reading them. I also pulled out my own story, which was still in progress. “What are you doing?” Veronica asked.“Working on my story,” I said. “Veronica, have you still not started working on yours?”Mrs. Knox had already e-mailed the class our workshop schedule. Our stories were due one session prior to our class critique. Veronica and I were two of the last to go, which gave us an extra week to compose and polish. But I didn’t want her to procrastinate too much, then turn in something embarrassing.Veronica didn’t answer me. “Do you want to hear about mine?” I volunteered. “It’s about a girl and a guy who want to go to Guatemala together, but the girl is afraid of airplanes, and the guy is afraid of cars. So they’re paralyzed. It’s sort of like a metaphor for their love.” Veronica groaned. “Don’t make unflattering noises when I talk about my story,” I said. “It makes me feel vulnerable.”“ I make you feel vulnerable? Imagine how you’re going to feel in the workshop. Everybody in there will be in college. They won’t respect anything you write. They’ll trash you.” That wasn’t what I wanted to hear. Yes, we would be the only high school students in the class, but our acceptance letters had stated that we’d been selected based on our “strongly crafted image-based prose” and that our writing showed “exceptional promise” and the director was “honored to be accepting such fresh talent into the program.” He’d even closed the letter by stating that discovering and encouraging students like us is what kept their program “vibrant, successful, and diverse.” I wanted to focus on those claims rather than on what Veronica was saying. “You’re way too hung up on this. I mean, have you read the first two stories yet? They’re trying way too hard to impress my mom. They’re suck-ups. Seriously. I already know what I’m going to say. First story: I liked the goat, but I had serious reservations about the other farm animals. Second story: Your protagonist didn’t feel like she was living in Maine. Can you add more landmarks and additional lobsters? We’ll dish out a few comments and the rest of the time is ours. It’s no big deal.”“Whatever,” I said. I didn’t like Veronica’s attitude. I knew she was disappointed that we hadn’t gotten into the nonfiction section. But she needed to get over it. We were still going to Prague. For a college-level program. And I, for one, was determined to make the most of it.“Okay, okay,” Veronica said, sensing my annoyance. “I plan on writing about a fox who gets his leg caught in a trap and a second fox comes along and they end up doing it. You know, a nature piece. As far as I’m concerned, they can take it or leave it.”“That actually sounds good,” I said. “It doesn’t matter. They’ll say it’s slight and expository and derivative, and compare it to Kafka just to show off how much they love Kafka. Then Hemingway. Then Salinger. Then Steinbeck. Then Camus. Writers love to demonstrate that they’ve read more books than you have. They shoot off literary