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Realistic Fiction. Published 2002, HarperCollins, Ages 8-12, $14.99.
Reviewer: Deidre Schneider
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![]() Jerry Spinelli’s Loser tells the story of a boy named Zinkoff, who has always been a bit different than his other classmates, from 1st grade to 6th grade. He starts off to be excited, anxious and happy about school. As he gets older, his classmates and other kids in school start to become more critical of each other, calling each other names and making fun of one another. Zinkoff is always eager to participate and try new things, however he begins getting made fun of for the mistakes he sometimes makes. Being completely unaware of his differences, he also begins to get rejected by other kids at school that he wants to make friends with. By the end of 3rd grade, Zinkoff still has no friends. In 4th grade his teacher sees something in him that makes the other students start to look for something good in him too, but does not last very long, as Zinkoff fails at the school Field Day and is teased because of it. Through the rest of 4th and 5th grade he is mocked and signified to as a “loser.” Once he hits 6th grade he has basically become invisible to both himself and his peers. Soon after this, Zinkoff does something absolutely astonishing. He hears that a young girl is missing, and immediately he goes searching for her. (Meanwhile it is the dead of winter; it is snowy, cold and unpleasant.) He looks for the girl for seven hours, nearly freezing to death. It is soon after he is found, he discovers the girl he was searching for had been found and returned home safely just a few hours earlier. The kids at school all hear of how brave was Zinkoff to risk his life to help save this little girl. They begin to recognize that he is a kind and loving boy. This makes them become more accepting of him, and finally Zinkoff goes from being treated like a “nobody” and a “loser” to being treated just like all the other students. This is a really powerful book, and would be great to teach students about what bullying is and how it can affect a person. Realistic Fiction. Published 2002, HarperCollins, Ages 8-12, $14.99. Reviewer: Deidre Schneider
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AuthorStudents from Kutztown University enrolled in LIB 221 and LIB 222
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