(Intro: Near the back of each issue of Twist, a national magazine for teenage girls, is a small feature called “E-mail This Boy,” where a regular sort of boy is pictured, his likes and dislikes listed, and his email address provided.

In December the “E-mail This Boy” subject was Chris Eggers, a 15-year-old friend of McSweeney’s with a hopeless, insatiable appetite for romance. The following are excerpts from a small fraction of the mail received — in all, over 600 emails in about five weeks — and which were first published in The Fuzz, a zine published by Chris and distributed to students at his high school.

Though all names have been changed in the letters below, the original spelling and grammar have not. Each line-break indicates a new letter, or portion thereof. If they start to blend together after a while, that is o-kay.

Note: All emails were answered in kind, and with kindness.)

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E-MAIL THIS BOY

Say hey to our newest e-mail boy, Chris, 15

HE SAYS HE’S: Shy, athletic, and full of tender lovin’
HE LIKES GIRLS WHO HAVE: A great personality, a good smile, and sweet love
HE LOVES TO: Flirt and play soccer
FAVE SPORT: Romance (Does that count?)
FAVE FLICK: Titanic: The love story of our time
HIS BIGGEST PET PEEVE: The forces of darkness
HE HOPES TO BE: A lion tamer
HE CRAVES: Chocolate chip l-o-v-e

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Hey Chris,
Wassup? My name is Vanessa, my nick name is Lil’Freak a.k.a Mc Lytes I am 15, I am haitian (I am obviously black) and I live in Montreal. I love sports, my favorite sport is football, I took danse classes b-4, so I am in pretty good shape, I eat a lot 4 a girl but I stay thin 4 some reasons…wutever. I have 3 lil’bros, I luv ‘em a lot, I go to a private school, I have lots of fun in my school…gotta lot of bruthas and sistas…many races, many colors…I ain’t racist. Some people say that I am real tough, but 4 real, I am a total sweetie…to sweet to be true. Neways, I’d like to get some mail from you soon, we could be friends, if not, ah well…
C-YA Vanessa a.k.a Lil’Freak

i have some chocolate chip L-O-V-E for you

I am a 20 year old that works at a High School Library I just graduated from High School.

Hi my name is Amanda.I hear your favorite sport is romance.Im not sure if thet is a real sport or not. If it is what position do you play?

Bonjour Chris!
Wassup? I’m Carine and I live close to Toronto. I read your little “add” in Twist magazine. Here’s a bit about me : I’m in grade ten, I’m french but perfectly bilingual, copper/blond hair, green eyes, 5"7, 130lbs. Well shaped, nice silhouette. I have a great sense of humour, but I know when to be serious. My red, well defined lips, make my smile the prettiest one around. I like music, reading, swimming, dacing, partying, singing, flirting. I play some sports but my favourite is also romance. I heard you liked soccer…did you watch the World Cup this summer? My country won! Anyways, I have seen Titanic, and I agree with you about the comment you made in the mag. You said you wanted to be a lion tamer….pretty cool. Maybe you could use your whip on me if I disobey you…. Later, I wanna travel…sick of studying. Since we both hate the forces of darkness, we could fight together against them. How about it?

I read about you in Twist magazine. To be brutally honest you sound kinda gay. It seems that you wrote all that stuff about love and romance just to get girls to e-mail you.

I had a boyfriend once where his favorite movie was any shakespeare movie. My fav movie is the “Wedding Singer” because I love romantic movies. I cried. That would be just amazing if a guy sang a love song to me in front of people or just to me.

You said that you hope to be a lion tamer. That is sooo cool! I’ve always wanted to be an elephant trainer.

Hey Chris, want to go to go tame some lions while we whatch Titanic??? You are pretty cute you know for 15yrs oldOr maybbe we could go eat some chocolate chip cookies together whjile we play soccer Your secret love Paulina

I think you pretty good looking and I just had one question for you. When you said your biggest pet peeve was the forces of darkness what did you mean becuse I am a Christian and belive that there are forces of darkness out there I’m just not on that side. So were you talking about the devil and his army? If so I would love to hear your point of view on the forces of darkness and light.

What exactly is choclate chip love and would you be interested in giving some of my friend that· Under your favorite sport, it said romance and in parenthesis it said does that count? I don’t think that that counts.

but wow are you really that shy to talk to girls or that much into to romance ? its just strange ya know, ohh well anyways maybe you don’t get all the girls cuz your so ahh not femine, but umm n/m.

Here’s another thing. I hate to type with capitals, so im gonna stop.

well my name is katharine and im 15 from buffalo ny i play alot of sports and love to chill with my posse

I’m still waiting for my prince charming though.

HI! I saw you in So if all that you said was true, where do you come from and is there more out there and can you come teach my guy friends to be so sweet? PLEASE!!!!

So how are you? I am good at the moment.
This may make you blush but I love your smile.

I am a figure skater, a volleyball player, I like to run, and I love sportsmanship!!
I dream of having a guy like you, sweet, and into life. YOu are so ‘everything.’

Anyway, my dream is to be an actress, but if that doesn’t work out, then I might be a forensic scientist.

My name is Danielle Jacquelyn Griffin. Everyone just calls me Danielle. I sort of have this big joke going on with my friends, that if my changed my middle name to Olga, my name would be D.O.G. Female dog…..hahaha. Oh well, I still think it would be pretty cool.

More tomorrow.