Spurt

Gr 6–8—An eighth grade boy is obsessed with his still-dormant puberty and a reality television show. Jack can't stand his childlike body, especially when it seems that everyone in his grade has already started to mature. He feels left behind and decides that the only way to keep up with his friends is to fake it. When the producers of Bigwigs, a reality television show that pits kids against one another as they spend a week doing various adult jobs, ask Jack to participate in a reunion show (he was on the show two years earlier), Jack seizes the opportunity. As one producer tells him, "This is reality TV, Jack. The last thing we want you to be is yourself." What follows is Jack's attempt to be the man he wishes he was. Readers ready to handle the many references to pubes and masturbation will find a warm coming-of-age story about a boy who learns that the best way to make and keep friends is to be true to himself.