- No More Dead Dogs
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No More Dead Dogs Author(s) Gordon Korman Language English Genre(s) Children's novel Publisher Hyperion Books Publication date 2000 Media type Print (Paperback) Pages 180 ISBN 0-7868-1601-5 OCLC Number 50608674 No More Dead Dogs is a novel by Gordon Korman published in 2002. Its title alludes to the fact that many books for children and young adults featuring dogs often have the dog die (such as Old Yeller or Where the Red Fern Grows), including the book that begins to cause the main source of all the character's problems, Old Shep, My Pal. Because of this, the drama club performing the play, Old Shep, My Pal, decide to change the ending and have the dog live.
Plot summary
Ever Since Wallace Wallace (main character) was young; he has always insisted on telling the truth. After having scored the winning touchdown for the Bedford Middle School football team in the championship, he becomes a popular guy. What the entire town and many on the football team, including his two best friends Mike, "Feather", Wrigly, and Rick Falconi, don't realize is that Wallace is really a benchwarmer, whose winning touchdown was a fluke. The only person in the entire town who knows the truth is Steve Cavanaugh, Wallace's ex-best friend, who turned on Wallace after he became the team's hero.
When Wallace is told to write a report on the book Old Shep, My Pal he won't lie. He dislikes the book, which results in a detention handed down by his English teacher, Mr. Fogelman until he writes a good review. Forced to spend the detention with the drama club, which happens to be producing the book in his report, Old Shep, My Pal, Wallace impresses the others in the club with his charisma and suggestions to improve the play. When finally released from his detention, he quits the football team to join the drama club, much to the anger of the most of the student body.
An unknown person begins vandalizing the play after Wallace is put into detention, and a fellow member of the drama club, Rachel Turner (an aspiring actress who writes to Julia Roberts as a form of expression) believes Wallace is the culprit, but everyone else continues to regard him as a hero. Rachel also has a little brother named Dylan who practically worships Wallace. Eventually, a final act of vandalism reveals a jersey that belongs to Wallace. As everybody in the drama club starts to turn against Wallace, Rachel instead starts to believe that Wallace isn't the one behind the attacks.
Wallace is eventually banned from the play and drama club, as everyone (but Rachel) begins to believe that he is the culprit. Despite having Wallace banned, the drama clubs decides to use all of his ideas for the play, one of which includes having Shep live at the end. This decision proves to be a hilarious disaster, when the culprit blows up the stuffed toy that is Shep during the play while the actors are praising the fact that Shep is living.
Wallace figures out that the culprit is Rachel's brother Dylan. Dylan wanted revenge on the play for "ruining" the famous Wallace Wallace. He then tells his first lie to spare her feelings. After immediate anger at Wallace, she then realizes that Dylan, not Wallace, was behind the attacks. Reconciling, they realize how much they like each other, along with reconciling with Steve, who in a final bit of humor, has become the object of adoration of Rachel's best friend, Trudi Davis, who up until that time been head over heels for Wallace.
Reception
Jo Clarke in her review for Book Report said that "this was one of the funniest books I have ever read!" and that "Middle school kids will enjoy this book because it is so typical of their language, actions, and ideas.".[1] The Journal of Adolescent & Adult Literacy said that "the book is filled with jokes for an adult audience rather than one comprised of middle schooler. These are jokes that desperately wish to be funny but the book produces only one that would be considered genuinely amusing to its demographic." and that "No More Dead Dogs had serious potential to be a better book than the writing produced."[2]
References
Categories:- 2002 novels
- Novels by Gordon Korman
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