Review: That Was Then, This Is Now by S. E. Hinton

Originally published: 1971
Acquired: ???
Read: October 2020

That Was Then, This Is Now by S. E. Hinton

The Outsiders and That Was Then, This Is Now were among a box of books that my father gave me when I was a kid. A bunch of Asimov was in that box, which I devoured; there was also some Vonneguts and the two Hinton books, which I never did for some reason. But after teaching and enjoying The Outsiders, I decided to add That Was Then to my reading list, and I've finally got round to it.

That Was Then, This Is Now isn't exactly a sequel to The Outsiders, but it's set in the same unnamed city, and Ponyboy is among the secondary characters. It's narrated by Bryon, a kid who makes money hustling pool, and mostly concerns his relationship with his friend Mark, who moved in with Bryon and his mother when his parents died. It's a quick read-- just 150 pages-- but an affecting one. Hinton's good at capturing that most important part of growing up: that the world is more complex than you thought, and there's nothing you can do about it. Somehow this book manages to be sadder than The Outsiders; while The Outsiders obviously has some dark stuff in it, it manages to end semi-optimistically, I think. But by the end of this book, Bryon has lost many of the people he cares about, by choice or by circumstance, and he isn't going to get them back. Hinton may have created a genre, but unlike some early works in a genre, this maintains its power, even fifty years on.