Is Kissing a Girl Who Smokes Like Licking an Ashtray?
by Randy Powell
from Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
Three Clams and an Oyster
by Randy Powell
from Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
High school juniors Flint McCallister, Dwight Deshutis, and Rick Beaterson's four-man flag football team, Three Clams and an Oyster, is short one shellfish. Cade Savage, their fourth, would rather party than practice. The guys know they have to get serious if they really want to go to Nationals, and they're soon scrambling to find a replacement before the September deadline. Should they go with Thor Hupf, who's a great player but a total stoner, or Tim Goon, who, despite his penchant for silk shirts and bad hair, owns a ski cabin that he might invite the Clams to? Their best bet is pretty jock Rachel Summerfield, whose natural talent for flag football almost outweighs the fact that she doesn't shave her legs, and well, she's a girl. Through riotously funny conversations, intense confrontations, and outright arguments, it becomes clear that there's a lot more to this three-way friendship than football. From one momentous Friday to Sunday, McCallister, Deshutis, and Beaterson wrestle with questions of life, death, and loyalty in their pursuit of the one oyster that holds their winning pearl.
Three Clams and an Oyster isn't about football any more than The Old Man and the Sea is about fishing. Instead, Randy Powell uses flag football as the metaphorical glue that holds this incredibly intelligent, subtle story about self-awareness and maturity together. He brilliantly captures that precise moment when adolescence blurs into adulthood, an epiphany that is sometimes a year in the making, or sometimes the product of one unforgettable weekend. (Ages 13 and older) --Jennifer Hubert
Sixteen-year-old Flint McCallister is the captain of a four-man flag-football team called Three Clams and an Oyster. Flint and the other two Clams, Beaterson and Deshutsis, are going to give this season all they’ve got, but, as usual, they’re having Oyster problems. The first Oyster on the team died a couple of years ago. The current one, Cade Savage, is partying too hard and is unreliable. Flint and the Clams are faced with a dilemma: should they stick with their old friend Cade or dump him and go with a new Oyster? And if they dump Cade, who will they get to replace him? Tim Goon, the unknown quantity with the roadkill hairdo? Thor, the nice-guy stoner? Or the girl, Summerfield, who pushes them out of their comfort zone and doesn’t shave her legs?
In searching for an Oyster, Flint and his buddies are forced to reexamine their hallowed traditions and old habits – and to take a hard look at who they are and where they’re going.
Dean Duffy
by Randy Powell
from Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
The Whistling Toilets (Aerial Fiction)
by Randy Powell
from Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
Sixteen-year-old Stan Claxton is recruited to coach his best friend, Ginny, a nationally ranked junior tennis player, through a local tournament. He is also supposed to find out why she has recently fallen into a slump. As Stan and Ginny slowly figure out just how their friendship will proceed, readers will delight in a quirky assortment of characters: Guballa and Wilcutts, Stan's other best friends, who both have the hots for Ginny; a female aerobics instructor with an incredible body and a face like Humphrey Bogart's; a glamorous unranked tennis player who might be a thief; Clinkt Eastwood--maybe; and the sophisticated Lord Boxton, one of Stan's tennis heroes, who previously owned the world's most expensive racquet. And then there are the whistling toilets. But readers will have to wait until the end of the novel to find out about those.
By no means a novel for sports lovers only, Randy Powell's latest assortment of likable eccentrics will win over readers of all predilections.
Tribute to Another Dead Rock Star
by Randy Powell
from Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
Grady Grennan is finding out that it's pretty hard to get over your mother's death when you hear her voice every time you switch on the radio. Besides being Grady's mom, Debbie Grennan was also a famous heavy-metal rock star. Since her drug overdose, Grady has tried to fill the hole she left in his life with everything from skateboarding to spending more time with his mentally disabled brother, Louie. But he can't quite seem to master the skateboard, and his time with Louie is often spoiled by the vicious arguments he has with Louie's stepmother, Vickie. Now the third anniversary of his mother's death is approaching, and Grady has been invited to a tribute concert in her honor. The concert weekend brings Grady's feelings to a head, and he must decide if he's going to be a real brother to Louie (and a part of Vickie's family) or remain just another long-haired slacker--the son of a dead rock star.
Through Grady's conflicted feelings for Louie, author Randy Powell successfully captures the struggle between selfishness and generosity that constantly rages in the teen psyche. "I can't imagine... not seeing Louie for a whole year. On the other hand, I can't imagine living in the same house with the guy, either." Grady's disagreements with Vickie over everything from music to religion crackle with a parent-child tension that teens will immediately find familiar and amusing. With the invention of Grady Grennan, Powell has given young adult literature a thoughtful new underdog--with the smart mouth of Rats Saw God's Steve York and the soul of The Outsiders's Ponyboy Curtis. (Ages 12 and older) --Jennifer Hubert
Swiss Mist
by Randy Powell
from Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
Is Kissing a Girl Who Smokes Like Licking an Ashtray? [4 Audio Cassettes/5.5 Hrs.]
![Is Kissing a Girl Who Smokes Like Licking an Ashtray? [4 Audio Cassettes/5.5 Hrs.]](http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51DQTkeM2RL._SL160_.jpg)
by Randy Powell
from Recorded Books, Inc.
Meet Biff, a weird, wild-haired high school senior with a couple of problems. Hes 18 but looks more like 14, which makes it hard for peopleespecially girlsto take him seriously. Hes too shy to say anything more than "Hi" to Tommie, the girl hes had a crush on for two years. The way things are going, it doesnt look like Biff will ever find a girlfriend or get the chance to kiss a girl. That is, until he meets Heidi. A beautiful, brash cigarette smoker, shes the kind of dangerous girl Biff usually tries to avoid. But the more he gets to know her, the more he realizes Heidi may be the best friend hes ever had. If he trusts her, she might even teach him how to talk to Tommie. Randy Powell delivers an authentic and poignant look at the real-life anxieties of todays teenagers. Smart dialogue, sassy characters, and swiftly-paced prose make this ALA Best Book for Young Adults an exciting choice.
Run If You Dare
by Randy Powell
from Farrar, Straus and Giroux (BYR)
Gardner Dickinson has always been very laid-back. That's why it doesn't really bother him that while his friends and sister seem to have long-term goals, he just moseys through life browsing through books and trying out weights, without ever finishing a novel or beginning an exercise program. Then, his dad gets laid off and can't seem to motivate himself to find another job. As he watches his father putter aimlessly in the garage day after day, Gardner begins to suspect that his inability to concentrate may be hereditary. And during a serious heart-to-heart talk about the state of their family, older sister Lacey confirms it: "You and Dad both have a problem in the focusing and following-through departments... you come up with a new delusion every week but you don't act on a single one." Gardner wants to prove Lacey wrong, so he takes up running, forcing himself to stick with it even when he wants to quit. But while Gardner is learning discipline, his dad seems to be slipping further and further into a deep depression. Can Gardner convince his father that it's not too late to change his ways before their family drifts apart from lack of focus?
Randy Powell has written a subtle, smart novel that sincerely portrays two of the most difficult hurdles of adolescence: the search for meaning in one's life and the dawning realization that parents are people, too. A thoughtful addition to Powell's collection of teen-boy-angst novels, the most recent being Tribute to Another Dead Rock Star. (Ages 13 and older) --Jennifer Hubert
What do you do when your dad has a midlife crisis? This is the dilemma of fourteen-year-old Gardner, whose father's been laid off and is now expressing boredom with his life, and even talking to Gardner about leaving the family. Gardner has all along thought he'd like to grow up to emulate his father, whom he has idolized since childhood. But, with this disappointment and possible betrayal haunting his family, Gardner isn't so sure anymore. Eventually, through old and new friendships and a dedicated endeavor to become physically strong, Gardner finds the emotional strength and identity to survive whatever upset may be in store for him and his family's future. In scenes both comical and heartbreaking, Randy Powell demonstrates once more that he is one of the foremost contemporary writers for young adults.
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