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EXPLOITS OF A RELUCTANT (BUT EXTREMELY GOODLOOKING) HERO by Maureen Fergus

EXPLOITS OF A RELUCTANT (BUT EXTREMELY GOODLOOKING) HERO

by Maureen Fergus

Pub Date: March 1st, 2007
ISBN: 1-55453-024-5
Publisher: Kids Can

A 13-year-old boy yearning for puberty and junk food finds himself sucked into a passionate fight to save a soup kitchen, despite his own resolutely selfish instincts. Possessed of a flippant attitude and advanced language skills, the glib young hero is the school cut-up. After pulling one too many pranks, he’s forced to keep a taped diary and to volunteer at the local soup kitchen, an establishment derided by the surrounding businesses, one of which his wealthy grandmother owns. He thinks he couldn’t care less, until he learns that one of his friends must eat there or go hungry. Fergus keeps the comic patter galloping along, all the while touching on issues of importance to emerging adolescent boys. She keeps it light and often hilarious, yet eventually touching, until the hero really becomes a hero. It’s a first-rate debut. Extraordinarily witty, zippy and entertaining throughout. (Fiction. YA)