Showing results by author "Gary Paulsen" in All Categories

I should have seen it coming. A long time before it came I should have known.I was six or seven years old and there was a girl living next door named Peggy. She was a year older than me and a lot stronger and we were wrestling and she held me down.... All of a sudden it seemed there was something about girls that wasn’t all bad. I didn’t know what it was but I should have known that this first feeling with Peggy Ollendorfer meant that down the road, later, I was in for a big surprise. Afterward, when I was a little older, if you’d asked me what the surprise was like, I’d have said it was about like getting hit by a train.

Ever open your locker and find that some joker has left something really weird inside? Seventh grader Dorso Clayman opens his and finds a dead body. Thirty seconds later, it disappears. It’s not the first bizarre thing that has appeared in his locker and then vanished. The ultimate gamesters have decided to make Dorso and his buddy Frank the target of some strange techno-practical jokes. They’ve hacked into the time line, and things from the past keep appearing in the present. Soon, the pranks aren’t funny anymore - they’re dangerous.

Gary Paulsen was one of the kids who slipped through the cracks, until art and dogs saved him. So are Jake, Jojo, and Jamie, all 12-year-olds who, like Gary Paulsen, had to grow up too fast. Gary Paulsen’s three poignant novellas add up to an unforgettable book.

It seemed like a normal school day until a horrible storm forced the very cautious school administration to make everyone hole up in a safe place. Six students find themselves stuck in a tiny, questionably smelly space - a school bathroom - with a stuffed cat for entertainment. Hijinks ensue, and the unexpected happens. They enter as strangers...and leave as friends.

Tony’s mom, Al, is a terrific single mother who works as a dancer at the Kitty Kat Club. Twelve-year-old Tony is a budding artist, inspired by backstage life at the club. When some of his drawings end up in an art show and catch the attention of the social services agency, Al and Tony find themselves in the middle of a legal wrangle and a media circus. Is Al a responsible mother? It’s the case of the stripper vs. the state, and Al isn’t giving Tony up without a fight.

When a small boy spends Christmas in the snowy Minnesota countryside, he becomes the official scout for his young bedridden cousin, Matthew, who is running out of secrets to explore. Matthew already knows there is no Santa Claus, and he knows his life is ending. As Christmas Eve approaches, the boy worries that he will be unable to find something magical for Matthew. But when that hopeful night arrives, the two are joined in a miraculous surprise that changes their lives forever.

Gary Paulsen has owned dozens of unforgettable and amazing dogs. In each chapter he tells of one special dog, among them Cookie, the sled dog who saved his life; Snowball, the puppy he owned as a boy in the Philippines; Ike, his mysterious hunting companion; Dirk, the grim protector; and his true friend Josh, a brilliant border collie.