A KID NOBODY WANTS

A kid nobody wants is an orphan, and this reprise of earlier years, from the time when at 5 he was placed in an Ohlo orphanage, has not only authentic accents but is actually autobiography loosely paraphrased as fiction (and so presented on the publisher's list). Unblemished by sentiment. It has a very sassy appeal as it annotates some random incidents at this institution where they ""kept in good mental health by getting away with things"" and maintained their light code of conformity-no ratting, and a corporate resistance to governesses, teachers and the superintendent. There's the time when at 12 he was almost adopted- but some unfortunate, unintentional mishaps sent him back: the tour with the band which gave them visiting privileges at a local hardware store- but his failure to steal a knife; his 9th grade nocturnal vision of Jesus which attracted the unwanted friendship of clean living, right thinking Jimmy Reed; his sexual tutelage under Crawdad Jackson who crashed the girls' dormitories, a private peepshow of the girls' swimming class, and a final emancipation- pretty Miss Russell, their English teacher, who held afternoon seminars in her bedroom.... All in all, maybe not kid stuff (an Esquire appearance for one section) but it should not go homeless.