Paul Fleischman continues his experimentation with format and voice in Seek. In this novel the author describes as a radio drama and laid out like a script , Fleishman employs a collage of 52 voices — some fully-developed characters, others mere snippets of sound that help propel the narrative. At the center of Seek is teenager Rob, whose father left when he was a baby. One of Rob’s most important possessions is the tape of one of his musician and disc jockey father’s old radio shows. Told both in the present and in past flashbacks, the book chronicles Rob’s quest to find his father on the airwaves. He starts by tuning in to stations in and around San Francisco. Later he tries picking up far-off AM stations late at night, and then he turns to shortwave radio. Rob’s quest is a private, poignant one. It rises above tragedy because he is surrounded by love. Rob is growing up in a singular, intellectually stimulating environment, with a strong, loving mother, grandparents, and aunts. As he grows, he finds friends and new interests. All of their voices, and a few words from a deejay in Lousiana, a baseball announcer in a distant city, an evangelist spreading the Word, and many others, form the tapestry of Seek. Classroom teachers will especially appreciate the author’s guidelines for presenting Seek as reader’s theater. (Age 14 and older)

Assigned to write his autobiography, high school senior Rob Radkovitz decides to listen back on his life. As he remembers the voices of his younger self, his quirky family, and his closest friends, one stands apart -- the haunting voice of his long-absent father, left behind on a single tape from one of his radio shows. Told in a collage of past and present voices, Seek follows Rob's obsessive search for his father, pursued not through San Francisco's streets, but through the labyrinth of the airwaves. Open the cover and listen in -- to psychic readers and pirate DJs, and to Rob's transforming views of his past and future.