How many times have parents wished they...

How many times have parents wished they could snap their spoiled children into a Third-World country to show them life without Nintendos, Reeboks and frozen yogurt! Kids don’t have to leave America, however, to see poverty or life styles vastly different from their own. If they were to travel along old Highway 42 in east Tennessee and stop for burgers near Cook’s Holler, they might overhear an opinion on Granddaddy’s horse or the junkyard auctions on Friday nights. These rural opinions and others are recorded in Stories I Ain’t Told Nobody Yet, a collection of 49 monologues and dialogues from the Appalachia regions. In her preface, author Jo Carson explains that she practices “being invisible” so she can hear the heart of people as they speak.

The result is heartfelt poems that, when read aloud, are nearly as rich as eavesdropping on the folks themselves. Most of these poems would be fun for kids to perform as skits. There’s the couple who courted for four decades, waiting for a disapproving mother to die; wedding advice; a battered wife; neighbor complaints, and observations on tourists. An old-timer reflects:

“And then I think

I grew up here,

worked here,

and I have made all my decisions

about here and for here,

and in those many moments

I have kept my family together

and in health,

I have lived in harmony and good

union

with my friends and neighbors

and I have kept

a piece of earth

in working order.

I am proud of that.”

Dissidents, by Los Angeles author Neal Shusterman, is an excellent glimpse of life on the other side of the globe. Fresh from Chicago, 15-year-old Derek Ferretti experiences prime-time culture shock in Moscow as the son of the U.S. ambassador to the Soviet Union. One of Derek’s first discoveries is that it is terribly uncool to dribble his basketball through Red Square and bounce it off the statue of Lenin.

There are other problems. Derek is ostracized by his classmates at the Anglo-American School. His mother is unaffectionate and, because she is the ambassador, she is too frazzled to help him adjust. Derek’s bodyguard is like having “Darth Vader as a babysitter.” Above all, Derek is grieving for his dad who was recently killed in a car accident.

Soon Derek meets Anna, the daughter of the famous dissident Yuri Shafiroff, and life takes on new meaning. While he helps smuggle her out of Moscow, he accidently tumbles off the train and wanders into the deserted remains of Chernobyl. Alone and horrified, he comes to terms with himself and, finally, his father’s death.

Shusterman writes well. Contrasts between the United States and Soviet Union are wonderfully descriptive, from political twists to the perils of playing basketball on cobblestones. Some passages could have been shortened but that is a minor quibble. Derek’s struggles, even his rebellion, make him likeable. After all, “(h)e was fifteen--he could still get away with being obnoxious.”

Back in the States, 17-year-old Brogan Arthur explores feminist ideals and nearly drives her friends and family nuts with all the analyzing she does. Let Me Tell You Everything: Memoirs of a Lovesick Intellectual is a delight. Author Barbara Bottner, also of Los Angeles, has a winner.

One warning: Readers who are used to sitcom plots better pull out their dictionaries and thinking caps. Brogan is not an ordinary teen and she is not easy on her audience.

“Americans are pleasure addicts,” she begins. How can she worry about waistlines and manicures when there are people starving in the world? Then there’s male dominance. “That’s why there have been so few woman artists, writers, and philosophers throughout history--women were busy being loved by men who were those things, but they didn’t have the courage or the vision or the child care to be those things themselves.”

Brogan has a terrific mind. She digests ideas while her friends diet. She expounds while her friends shop. Her head expands from books, not a blowdryer. So how can she compromise when she falls in love with her social studies teacher? Instead of planning for college, she now wants to primp for Mr. Price. “Was Gloria Steinem like this, opinionated and impassioned until you got her into a department store. Did she suddenly defect into Victoria Principal the minute you put something trendy in her hands?”

Brogan’s ability to laugh at herself makes her erudition bearable. “Memoirs” isn’t quick reading but it is worth every thought-provoking pause.

STORIES I AIN’T TOLD NOBODY YET by Jo Carson (Orchard Books: $12.95; 84 pp.)

DISSIDENTS by Neal Shusterman (Little, Brown: $13.95; 183 pp.)

LET ME TELL YOU EVERYTHING Memories of a Lovesick Intellectual by Barbara Bottner (Harper & Row: $12.95; 150 pp.)