Revenge of the Snob Squad

July 1, 1998
Gr 4-6-Told from the perspective of a wisecracking, overweight sixth-grade girl, this contemporary story deals with typical adolescent issues-appearance; popularity; social status; physical, emotional, and psychological differences; and friendship. Peters uses humor to hook readers and to get her positive messages across. Jenny Solano and her group of fellow outsiders form "the Snob Squad," but realize after a series of unsuccessful schemes that revenge is not always as sweet as they had imagined. Readers will chuckle as they read each new episode, such as "Operation Green Hair." This amusing light read is sure to be popular with fans of the Babysitters Club and with readers who have outgrown Ellen Conford's Jenny Archer. It deals realistically with problems that many youngsters face and may even allow them to laugh at themselves in the process.-Barb Lawler, Carnegie Library of Pittsburgh, PA

September 15, 1998
Gr. 4^-6. The cute, glossy jacket illustration is misleading: this is not a cheerful friendship romp but a dark laugh-out-loud comedy about four middle-school outcasts who form the Snob Squad to get back at the bullies who humiliate them. Narrator Jenny, who eats compulsively ("they call me Lardo Legs to my face"), speaks with a sharp self-mockery. Another Squad member is physically disabled peg-leg Prairie, whom the kids tease unmercifully. Then there's Maxine, huge and macho, who lives in a ramshackle house in a junkyard. The fourth member is whining Lydia, the psychologist's daughter. Unlike Carbone's "Starting School with an" "Enemy" (reviewed on p.226), the bullies in this story not only do yucky tricks but also hit where it hurts. But Jenny finally confronts her greatest anguish--she betrayed a close friend in trying to please the popular crowd--and decides not to be like them. When the Squad tries for revenge, it achieves only bumbling farce, but the outcasts are together, and that turns out to be their greatest weapon. Peters has written a moving story with laughter that doesn't make the sadness go away but makes it almost bearable. ((Reviewed September 15, 1998))(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 1998, American Library Association.)