King Dork

March 13, 2006
Told from the perspective of Tom, a "brainy, freaky, oddball kid who reads too much, so bright that his genius is sometimes mistaken for just being retarded," this debut novel expresses a cynical view of high-school life and a teen's passion for rock music. Much of the story focuses on a seemingly endless string of humiliations and tortures dished out by Tom's teachers and sadistic "psychotic normal" classmates. A more compelling and subtly drawn subplot details mysteries that Tom is trying to solve: Was his father's death a few years earlier really an accident? What is the meaning of the coded messages found in his father's copy of The Catcher in the Rye
? (The key role of Salinger's novel is hinted at by this book's telltale vintage burgundy cover, on which "King Dork" is written over Salinger's title.) When he's not playing Sherlock Holmes or dodging bullies (the types who "try to trip you anonymously and knock you over as you go by in the hallway"), Tom daydreams about the band he plans to form with his only friend Sam. Budding rock musicians and students with a grudge against the public-high-school scene will most relate to Tom's narrative. If the protagonist's battle with peers and a tyrannical associate principal grows a little tedious at times, the author's biting humor and skillful connection of events will keep pages turning. Ages 14-up.

August 25, 2009
Tom "Chi-Mo" Henderson is the King Dork at his suburban high school, where every English teacher worships at the altar of The Catcher in the Rye. Tom believes that their affection is misguided until he finds his late father's battered copy in a box in the garage. The book starts an adventure that involves "dead people, naked people, fake people, teen sex, weird sex, drugs, ESP, Satanism.." You get the picture. Why It Is for Us: The best moments in this book play on the stupid ways we grown-ups try to stay connected to the teens in our lives. Tom's stepfather (also a Tom, "Little Big Tom") is a good man with the hard job of helping bring a smart, cynical, music-lovin' Dork to adulthood. A chronology of band names (Tom and his best friend, Sam, go through 25 names for their band in five months) and a glossary (with delightfully mish-mashed pronunciations) end the book on an uproarious note. You'll never hear the song "Glad All Over" in the same way again. Be sure to catch Portman's next book, Andromeda Klein, out this month.-Angelina Benedetti, King Cty. Lib. Syst., WA

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