How I Survived Bullies, Broccoli, and Snake Hill - Rilegato

Patterson, James; Tebbetts, Chris

Rilegato

ISBN 10: 0316231754 ISBN 13: 9780316231756

Casa editrice: Jimmy Patterson, 2013

Riassunto

Rafe Khatchadorian, the hero of the bestselling Middle School series, is ready for a fun summer at camp--until he finds out it's a summer school camp! Luckily, Rafe easily makes friends with his troublemaking cabin mates and bunkmate, a boy nicknamed Booger-Eater, who puts up with endless teasing from the other kids. Rafe soon realizes there's more to a person than a nickname, though, and Booger-Eater might be the kind of friend you want on your side when the boys from the Cool Cabin attack.

This fourth book in the massively popular Middle School series is an unforgettable summer of hi-jinks, new friends, and surprises, all told with the hilarity and honesty readers have come to expect from blockbuster author James Patterson.

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Informazioni sull?autore

James Patterson has had more New York Times bestsellers than any other writer, ever, according to Guinness World Records. Since his first novel won the Edgar Award in 1977 James Patterson's books have sold more than 300 million copies. He is the author of the Alex Cross novels, the most popular detective series of the past twenty-five years, including Kiss the Girls and Along Came a Spider. He writes full-time and lives in Florida with his family.

Estratto. © Ristampato con autorizzazione. Tutti i diritti riservati.

Middle School: How I Survived Bullies, Broccoli, and Snake Hill

By James Patterson, Chris Tebbetts, Laura Park

Little, Brown Books for Young Readers

Copyright © 2013 James Patterson Chris Tebbetts Laura Park
All rights reserved.

ISBN: 978-0-316-23175-6

CHAPTER 1

A SLAM-BAM ENDiNG?!

Do you ever read the first line of a book and SLAM the thing shut? I sure do.

I hope you didn't do that to my story. Guess I'll never know.

Anyway, hi. I'm Rafe Khatchadorian, and if you already know me, then you know Ido things a little differently than most people. I like to break the rules. No,I love to break rules. Especially dumb ones, like no talking in thehallways at my school and only being allowed to use the bathroom two times aday, no matter what.

So I don't know if this has been done before in the history of books, but I'mgoing to tell you some of the ways this story might end. And I'm going to do itright here at the beginning of the book.

I went to summer camp/summer school this year. But before the full eight weekswere up, things went kind of cuckoo-crazy (okay, a lot cuckoo-crazy),and I ended up packing my bags early. (Actually, some camp counselors packedthem for me.)

My unexpected departure might have had something to do with this emergencysituation:

Or maybe what happened was more like this unfortunate event:

It also could have gone something like this:

Or like this picture, which says about ten thousand words:

I can tell you for sure that it had something to do with this little disaster:

Somewhere in all of that, there's an ending to this crazy story. There's somemiddle in there too.

But that's as much as I'm going to tell you for now. If you want all the gorydetails, you're going to have to read on. At your own risk.

I'll tell you this much: This is a tale of bullies and broccoli, of shockingbravery and even more shocking cowardliness (or however you say that), ofgallons of puke, of friends and fiends, and of being totally, hopelessly lost ona place called Snake Hill.

I promise: You won't be bored.

Maybe you read Middle School, The Worst Years of My Life. Well, this wasthe Worst Summer of My Life.

But it was also—weirdly—the best.

CHAPTER 2

WeLCOMe TO CAMP WANNAMORRA

Now that we've gotten the ending out of the way, I guess we can start the story.

You know those regular-type camps, where kids with spiffy haircuts spend thesummer running around in the fresh air, and roasting marshmallows to an evenbrown, and swimming in the lake all day long? Maybe you've even been to one ofthose places.

Well, hold that thought. Here's another question:

Have you ever read that book Holes? If you haven't, you should, becauseit's an awesome book. But there was a camp in that story too—Camp GreenLake, which was actually a prison for kids.

Let's say that the place I went, Camp Wannamorra, was somewhere right in themiddle of all that. Half camp and half prison. And by "prison" I meanschool.

That's right. Me. Summer school. AGAIN.

Every morning from eight to twelve at Camp Wannamorra, we were going to be inclasses. I was going to take the kind for kids who need a little extra help. Andmy brainiac sister, Georgia, was going to take the "Challenge Program," for kidswho had nothing better to do on vacation than get smarter than they alreadywere. It didn't sound anything like camp to me.

The more Mom talked about it, the more excited Georgia got, which made me evenmore suspicious. Mom kept calling it "summer camp," but I was pretty sure it wasgoing to look something like this.

If you read my last two books—or even my sister Georgia's stupidstory—then you know that school isn't exactly my best subject.I've already "done time" at Hills Village Middle School and Cathedral School ofthe Arts and Airbrook Arts. (I'm kind of, sort of, an artist, but moreabout that later.)

The bottom line was, if I wanted to keep going to Airbrook, I needed to "do someremedial work" over the summer.

CHAPTER 3

GOOD-BYe AND GOOD LuCK (BeCAuSe, RAFe, YOu'Re GOiNG TO NeeD IT)

My mom and Grandma Dotty drove me and Georgia up to camp for the first day.

"You sure you have everything we packed? Everything you need?" Mom asked usabout ten times from the front seat of our smoking—and I mean smoking in abad way—eighteen-year-old family van.

"I'm sure!" Georgia said. "And in fact, I'm sure that I'm sure."

Georgia had packed about eight weeks in advance, checked her list forty times,and then made a copy of the list to make sure she wouldn't lose it ... anddouble-checked that too. My sister may be smart, but she's also nuttier than asquirrel's nest on the first day of winter.

"Rafe, what about you?" Mom asked, because I'm kind of the opposite of Georgia."Do you have everything you need?"

"Um ... I guess so," I said. "Y'know, like I said last time you asked. Threeminutes ago."

The good news was that we had a whole lake between the boys' side of the campand the girls' side. If I was lucky, I'd hardly see Georgia at all for the wholeeight weeks. It almost made the summer-school thing worth it. (I saidalmost.)

When we drove onto the camp grounds, we got to the boys' side first. I pulledout my stuff from the back and tried to make a clean getaway, but Mom's prettymushy about this stuff. She needed to get in a few hugs before I could go.

"I know it's school, but it's camp too," she said. "I think you just might havea good time. I really do!"

"Assuming you don't get eaten by a bear," Grandma said. She was looking at thecamp brochure. "Or lost on Snake Hill. Or—"

"Snake Hill?" Georgia said from the backseat. "There's a Snake Hill here? Whatdoes that mean? Like ... real snakes? Really?"

I love Grandma Dotty, but sometimes she says stuff without thinking about it."So long, kiddo!" she said. She reached over then and hugged me too, reallytight, the way she always does. "You're either going to love it, or you're goingto hate it here. Put that in your pipe and smoke it." (My grandma says stufflike that all the time.)

Anyway, I was kind of nervous. It's one thing to be a nobody at school, when youcan go home at the end of the day. It's another thing to get dropped off in themiddle of the woods, with a camp full of total strangers who you're going to beliving with, eating with, and sleeping with for the next fifty-six days andnights (or so I thought at the time).

"Come on, Jules," Grandma said. "Camp doesn't start until the parents leave. Weneed to drop off Miss Georgia and skedaddle!"

"Georgia? Rafe?" Mom said. "Do you want to say good-bye to each other?"

"Not really," Georgia said.

"Whatever," I said.

"Well, do it anyway," Mom said.

Okay, one more little bit of truth here. It was true that I couldn't wait to getaway from Georgia, even if we would just be on two sides of the same camp. Butnow that Mom and Grandma were about to take off, some teeny, tiny part of me wasglad that Georgia would be around. I don't know why. I just was.

And for the record, if you ever tell her I said that, I'm going to hunt you downand put fire ants in your sleeping bag.

You've been warned.

CHAPTER 4

MeeT THe BOOGeR EATeR

I guess that the first day of camp is a little like the first day of school. Youcan spot the popular kids right away, because they've already latched on to agiant blob of about a million friends. Other kids just look kind of lost. (Guesswhich group I was in?)

So far, it was all too familiar.

When I gave my name to the nearest counselor with a clipboard, he looked at hislist and said, "Yep, here you are. Rafe Khatchadorian. You'll be with Rusty andthe Muskrats."

I had no idea what that meant. It sounded like some kind of terrifyingly badband.

"Just take your gear and head down that path," he said. He pointed into thewoods. "It's the fifth cabin on your right."

From the parking lot, I followed the twisty path he showed me and counted theother cabins along the way. The first one had a sign on the front that said anthill and a bunch of little kids running around in front. After that came Sly FoxRun, then Bald Eagle's Nest, then Grizzly Bear Cave, and finally ... MuskratHut.

And I thought—seriously? I could have been an Eagle or a Bear or aFox, but no. For the next eight weeks, I was going to be a Muskrat. Great.

The first person I met was Rusty, our cabin counselor. He was waiting, rightthere on the front porch steps, with his own clipboard.

Cabin counselor is kind of like homeroom teacher—except Rusty wasn't likeany home-room teacher I'd ever seen before. He was more like three teachers, allpacked into one body. And I don't mean that he was fat. He looked like the kindof guy who spent all day at the gym and then dreamed about lifting weights atnight just so he could get in an extra workout. Even his muscles had muscles.

"Hey, Rafe, dude, super cool to meet you!" he said, while he broke most of thebones in my hand. "You pumped? I hope you're pumped, 'cause we're going to havea super-awesome time this summer."

"Um ... awesome?" I said, because I didn't know what else to say.

Meanwhile, there was a whole bunch of insane yelling and pounding coming frominside the cabin. It sounded like my cabinmates were tearing it down from theinside out, but Rusty didn't seem to care or even notice. The only other personI could actually see was this skinny kid on the front porch, reading thethickest book I've ever seen.

"Yo, Norman!" Rusty said. "Put down the Encyclopedia Normanica a sec and comemeet your bunk mate."

I'm not going to lie. All I thought when I saw him was, I hope this kidbrought sunblock. He looked like he'd just crawled out from under some rock.

And then I thought, Wow. His glasses were about as thick as his book. It didn'ttake a genius to guess that he was here for the Challenge Program, not for theone for kids like me.

"Rafe, Norman. Norman, Rafe," Rusty said. When we shook hands, it was a littlelike grabbing hold of an uncooked chicken cutlet. "Why don't you show him wherehe's bunking?"

"Sure," Norman said, pulling open the squeaky, old screen door to the cabin."And thanks, Rusty."

"For what?" he said.

"For not calling me—"

"BOOGER EATER!" came a chorus of voices from inside the cabin.

Then a pillow flew out the door and practically knocked Norman off the porch.Not that it would take that much. I kind of felt sorry for him right away.

Except then I started thinking ...

On the inside, the cabin was pretty basic. And by basic, I mean that cavemenwould have asked for an upgrade. On the windows, there were just screens withholes and rips, no glass, and four seriously lopsided bunk beds. You could seebetween the floorboards to the ground outside, and the ceiling was just bigwooden beams, all the way up to the roof. That's where most of the other guyswere, crawling around. And that's where the next two pillows came from.

"BOOGER EATER!"

"NEW KID!"

One of the flying pillows caught me in the face. The other one whizzed pastNorman. He acted like it hadn't even happened.

"This is your bunk," he said. It was a bottom one, and closest to the door. Allthe other beds were taken. I guess that's what you get for being the last onein. Not only was I bunking with a kid named Booger Eater, but if we got visitedby a grizzly bear in the middle of the night, guess who was first in line on theall-you-can-eat human buffet?

Still, I was going to worry about that later. For now, I was trying to figureout if these guys were piling on because I was the new kid or because I wasalready part of the group. Or both. They seemed kind of okay, though.

What I did know was that as long as Norman the Booger Eater was around, I had anabove-average shot at not being the biggest loser in the cabin. That was worthsomething, right?

The Muskrats. The Muskrats? The Muskrats! (It doesn't matter how you sayit—it still sounds lame.)

Here, let me introduce you to the guys.

CHAPTER 5

WHO'S WHAT'S FOR DiNNeR?

You know what, Nuke?" Dweebs told me. "You're going to fit right in here."

Say what?

"Nuke?" I said.

Dweebs just kind of shrugged. "It's short for New Kid. You're the only one whowasn't here last year."

I guess everyone at Camp Wannamorra had a nickname. Or at least all the Muskratsdid. Besides, I didn't mind Nuke so much. It was better than some of the otherpossibilities. Like Booger Eater.

Meanwhile, all that moving in had worked up an appetite, I guess. By the timethey rang the big dinner bell down at the main building, I was starving.

"Don't get too excited," Smurf told me. "Not unless you're a big fan of mushyoatmeal."

"Or mushy broccoli," Cav said.

"Yeah," Two Tunz said. "I lost ten pounds last summer. And that wasafter the pie-eating contest."

I didn't even care, though. At least I wouldn't be eating alone. Camp had onlystarted an hour ago, and I already had a cabin full of friends.

We all walked down to the Chow Pit together. Cav told me that was the name forthe cafeteria. But when we got there, I didn't see a cafeteria at all. Just abunch of rickety picnic tables in a big circle on the grass, with a little hutoff to the side.

"This is it?" I said. "There's not even a roof. What if it gets hot out?"

"Then we sweat," Bombardier told me.

"What if it rains?" I asked.

"Then the meat loaf isn't so dry," Two Tunz said with a laugh. He and Bombardierhigh-fived right over my head.

Every cabin had its own picnic table in the circle. We sat down at the Muskrattable while Rusty went with the other counselors to get the plates andsilverware and stuff. That left about a hundred campers outside, all runningaround and laughing and talking at once.

At first, I didn't really notice anything out of the ordinary. It was just abunch of blah-blah-blah and buzz-buzz-buzz all around me.

But then ... I started to hear stuff I didn't like.

I was just starting to put two and two together, when I heard someone from acouple tables over who was louder than everyone else.

"What's for dinner?" the voice asked.

"Dead meat!" someone else said.

"What's for dinner?" the voice asked again.

This time, a bunch of guys answered and pounded on the table at the same time."DEAD! MEAT!"

"Oh, man," Smurf said. "Here we go."

When I looked over, I saw the kid who was leading the whole thing, and I knewhis type right away. Put it this way: If you took the words cocky andconceited and pain in the butt and then combined them all intoone big word ... and then looked that word up in the dictionary, you'dsee a picture of this guy.

"Who's that?" I said.

"Doolin," Smurf told me. "He's in the Bobcat cabin. Just ignore him."

But I didn't really see how. Every time Doolin said "What's for dinner?" andevery time the other Bobcats answered "Dead meat!" they were all looking rightat us. We were the dead meat.

The other guys at my table were just shaking their heads or looking at theground, except for Norman, who was reading, and Legend, who was ...laughing? I had no idea what Legend's deal was, but he obviously thoughtthis was pretty funny.

I only wished I thought it was funny.

"What's for dinner?" Doolin kept going, like a Britney Spears song that repeatsover and over and over till you want to yank your ears right off your head.

"DEAD! MEAT!"

"What's for—"

Then somebody else yelled out even louder. "Yo! Doolin!" I looked over, andRusty was standing there. "Have a seat, dude."

"What? I'm just playin' around," he said.

"I know, man. But have a seat anyway."

"What-ev," Doolin said, and high-fived the kid next to him before he took histime sitting down.

I was glad Rusty was back. But then again, this was only the first day.Something told me Rusty wasn't always going to be there, and that Doolin and hiswrecking crew weren't done with us.

That wasn't all either.

So far, I'd been feeling like I'd lucked out, getting into this crazy, coolcabin of guys. But now I was starting to think maybe all of us Muskrats hadsomething in common with Booger Eater, and I hadn't realized it. Maybe we werethe biggest losers at Camp Wannamorra.

And maybe everyone already knew it.

(Continues...)

Excerpted from Middle School: How I Survived Bullies, Broccoli, and Snake Hill by James Patterson, Chris Tebbetts, Laura Park. Copyright © 2013 James Patterson Chris Tebbetts Laura Park. Excerpted by permission of Little, Brown Books for Young Readers.
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.

Dettagli dell?edizione

• Editore: Jimmy Patterson
• Data di pubblicazione: 2013
• ISBN 10: 0316231754
• ISBN 13: 9780316231756
• Rilegatura: Copertina rigida
• Lingua: Inglese
• Numero di pagine: 309
• Disegnatore: Park Laura
• Contatto del produttore: non disponibile