Hartinger, Brent Books

Geography Club

Brent Hartinger

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 79 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Teaching Tolerance 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

This is a great book that should be considered for a high school's library collection. It helps teens deal with sexual orientation issues in a non-threatening way. Could be eye opening for those who are trying to understand what teens of different sexual orientations experience. May help others become more tolerant of others' differences.

Very fun and very fast. 4 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

The Geography Club is a fun book. Very fast pased. Russel is an interesting carector, but I was just wondering where the parents were through all this. He never had a conversation with any of his parents, or adults for that matter, except the coach, and it was very brief. But besides that, I enjoyed the story. Can't wait to read the sequel.

Editorial Review:

I knew that any wrong action, however slight,
could reveal my true identity. . .

Russel is still going on dates with girls. Kevin would do anything to prevent his teammates on the baseball team from finding out. Min and Terese tell everyone they're just really good friends. But after a while, the truth's too hard to hide -- at least from each other -- so they form the "Geography Club." Nobody else will come. Why would they want to? Their secret should be safe.

Split Screen: Attack of the Soul-Sucking Brain Zombies / Bride of the Soul-Sucking Brain Zombies

Brent Hartinger

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 10 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Just gets better and better 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

Usually I'm not crazy about sequels as it means the author doesn't have any other ideas and ends up repeating themselves. But Hartinger managed to avoid that in The Order of the Poison Oak and he does so again--pretty cleverly--with Split Screen. Not only does he continue to further the stories of Russell, Otto, Kevin, and Min, but he does it by writing two books in one that cover the same period of time from two different points of view--Russell and Min's. Frankly, I've never read anything like it.

Both stories draw you in (read Russell's first), but the second makes you realize that not everything you read before was really the way it seemed. Which is a lot like life.

I guarantee you won't be disappointed. FYI, I know the author but I mean every word I said!

Editorial Review:

It's a horror-movie extravaganza in this companion to Brent Hartinger's Geography Club! Two books in one recount the stories of best friends Min and Russel who sign up to be extras on the set of a zombie film - then learn that there's nothing scarier than high school romance!

Read one story, flip the book over, and read the other! In Attack of the Soul-Sucking Brain Zombies, Russel must choose between his long-distance boyfriend and a close-to-home ex who wants to get back together. In Bride of the Soul-Sucking Brain Zombies, Min struggles to accept her cheerleader girlfriend's decision to stay in the closet.

Russel and Min's separate stories affect each other in surprising ways - but you'll have to read both books to find out how!

The Order of the Poison Oak

Brent Hartinger

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 32 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Another Home Run! 5 out of 5 stars.
1 of 1 people found this review helpful.

After reading Geography Club, I had to immediately go buy The Order of the Poison Oak.

I was not disappointed. If it's of any consequence, I read the whole thing in one sitting. I simply could not put it down - even when the wee hours of the morning were creeping up on me and I could barely keep my eyes open from lack of sleep (and I had to get up the next morning).

This book, an extremely strong sequel to Geography Club, can stand alone on its own (just like Geography Club) and is an amazing work of literary genius. Brent manages again to help bring emotion, vision, and strength to another story that contains many things that many of us have dealt with throughout our lives. This book, like Geography Club, seems to be mainly geared towards teens, but being 25, I can still seriously relate - and I think anyone can.

Brent helps us all to realize that we're all special, regardless of the person that we are - and that it's truly our autonomy that makes us special as people: being unique is what truly brings us all together in a world and society that stresses conformity.

Editorial Review:

Russel Middlebrook needs to get away. It's tough being sixteen and out at your high school. So being a summer camp counselor sounds like the perfect solution -- but Russel has no idea how crazy this summer will be. Rowdy ten-year-old burn survivors, Indian legends, moonlit skinny dipping, and passionate summer romance are just the beginning . . . and then there's the new secret society, the Order of the Poison Oak.

Grand & Humble

Brent Hartinger

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 13 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Courtesy of Teens Read Too 5 out of 5 stars.
2 of 3 people found this review helpful.

Two boys, who on the outside couldn't be more different. Harlan Chesterton is good looking, popular, the rich son of a prominent Senator. He's an ace on the school swim team, he's dating the beautiful Amber, his best friend, Ricky, has street cred. If it weren't for the debilitating panic attacks, along with the flashes of tragic premonition that Harlan experiences, his life would be perfect. After all, that's what his mother is aiming for--running the lives of her husband and son until every detail is absolutely perfect.

Manny Tucker, on the other hand, is a geek. A theater geek, to be exact. Never one to attract attention, Manny prefers working behind the scenes with the lighting, bringing the stars of the stage into perfect, shining glory. He's not popular, he's often picked on by the other kids in school, and his good friend, Elsa, is deaf. He likes working on the computer, coming up with movies to film with Elsa, and living a simple life with his single-father dad. Except lately he's been having vivid nightmares that seem to portend a tragic ending.

How is it that two boys, so far removed on both a social and financial level, should share the same feelings of dread and uncertainty that Harlan and Manny do? And how is the intersection of Grand and Humble, a scene which both see in their unwanted "visions" of either the past or future, involved?

GRAND & HUMBLE is an engaging mystery that delves into the paranormal. The result is a thriller with twists and turns and a surprise ending that will leave even the best of detectives guessing until the final page. Not to be missed by all lovers of a good, thought-provoking "what if" story, GRAND & HUMBLE is sure to please!

Editorial Review:

Harlan's a popular kid and Manny's a geek.

But something strange is happening to both of them. Harlan is slowly losing his grip because he's plagued by panic attacks he can't control. And Manny has started having nerve–racking nightmares that leave him exhausted and terrified.

In this complex and original novel, popular author Brent Hartinger takes us on an intense psychological journey as Harlan and Manny struggle with a fear they can't name. It's a journey that eventually leads downtown, where a secret lies at the intersection of Grand and Humble.

The Last Chance Texaco

Brent Hartinger

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 25 Average rating: 4.5 of 5

Courtesy of Teens Read Too 5 out of 5 stars.
0 of 0 people found this review helpful.

Brent Hartinger has crafted a touching and suspenseful novel sure to capture and hold any teen reader's attention. He knows his craft well, having created an edgy novel about the foster care system with a tasteful, deft touch, ensuring it a wide readership. He has proven that tough issues and hard situations teens face can be portrayed with minimal violence and profanity.

Like his earlier novel, Geography Club, Hartinger has crafted several sympathetic characters among a microcosm of society's misfits. This novel's group of excluded teens are orphans, kids whose perception of themselves is nearly as negative as their peers at school, who deride them as "groupies" (foster children in group homes). The reader is drawn into their conflicts, both within their own walls, their own psyches, and with society-at-large.

The narrator, Lucy, has been a foster child for over half of her life. Kindle Home is the last, "safe" stop for teens like her, for those who have been in trouble. Children who "wash out" of Kindle Home are then sent to Rabbit Island, a place for teens beyond redemption--in the eyes of the system, at least. As a veteran of group homes, she vows to make an effort to fit in at Kindle, which proves to be difficult. Newcomers are viewed as a challenge of the "pecking order" and it isn't long before Lucy is facing serious challenges from others in the home.

Her school environment presents another challenge when she is caught in a social caste disagreement with two of her peers. In spite of the odds against them, she makes a friend from one of her earlier antagonists, a person who proves to be a crucial ally when Kindle Home faces community persecution and budget cuts. As the new friends try to find out who has been setting fires in the neighborhood in order to frame the members of Kindle Home, Hartinger provides an unexpected twist when he unveils the perpetrator.

With a heart-warming ending, Hartinger proves that edgy young adult fiction can still leave a reader with hope. THE LAST CHANCE TEXACO is suitable even for middle school-aged students. Recommended. Five stars.

Reviewed by: Mark Frye, author and reviewer

Editorial Review:

The guy looked at me with a stare that would have frozen antifreeze.

"You the new groupie, huh?"

"Yeah," I said. "So?"

"So no one wants you here. Why don't you go back where you came from?"

I can't go back, I wanted to say. That was the thing about living in a group home. There was nowhere for me to go but forward.

Brent Hartinger's second novel, a portrait of a subculture of teenagers that many people would like to forget, is as powerful and provocative as his first book, Geography Club.

Project Sweet Life

Brent Hartinger

Amazon Price: $11.55 List Price: $16.99 Not yet published By: HarperTeen

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Editorial Review:

For most kids, fifteen is the year of the optional summer job: Sure, you can get a job if you really want one, but it isn't required or anything. Too bad Dave's dad doesn't agree! Instead of enjoying long days of biking, swimming, and sitting around, Dave and his two best friends are being forced by their fathers into a summer of hard labor.

The friends have something else in mind, though: Not only will they not work over the summer, but they're determined to trick everyone into believing they really do have jobs. So what if the lifeguard doesn't have a tan or the fast-food worker isn't bringing home buckets of free chicken? There's only one problem: Dave's dad wants evidence that his son is actually bringing in money. And that means Dave, Curtis, and Victor will have to get some . . . without breaking the law and without doing any work!

Project Sweet Life is designed for the funny and lazy bone in all of us—a true comedy of errors (without any effort!) from seasoned storyteller Brent Hartinger.

Dreamquest

Brent Hartinger

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Customer Reviews:
Total reviews: 4 Average rating: 4.0 of 5

powerful character study starring a preadolescent marooned in her nightmares 5 out of 5 stars.
4 of 4 people found this review helpful.

Her parents' constant fights frighten eleven year old Julie Fray. She is so scared that something bad is going to happen that even when she sleeps she suffers nightmares that she is a pawn on a chessboard with her mom as the white queen and her dad as the black king each giving orders for her to move. The dreams are getting worse and the preadolescent child has no one to turn to as her parents are too caught up with their war to see what it is doing to her. Being awake is as bad if not worse.

This time when she suffers the nightmare, Julie awakens but not to the hostility between her parents pulling on her to their side. Instead somehow she is still inside her nightmare realm. Specifically she finds herself in a studio where Julie's dreams are a big production. Production assistant Roman befriends the bewildered frightened young girl and tells her to find the producer. However Julie has a bigger problem than getting nightmares less frightening. The child actress who portrays her, Vivian has crossed over to the real world and refuses to switch back. If she fails to return to reality, she will be trapped inside her head where a studio produces the nightmare world of Julie Fray.

DREAMQUEST is a powerful character study that hooks the audience once they realize Julie is marooned in her nightmares. The story line is set up so that readers are unsure whether this is a horror tale or a psychological thriller; in either case Julie and the preadolescent audience will agree that she is in deep trouble regardless. This tale of Slumberia is a fantastic novel that will please its pre-teen crowd, but also their parents.

Harriet Klausner

Editorial Review:

Eleven-year-old Julie Fray is living a nightmare. Her parents are fighting so much she can't even escape when she goes to sleep. Every night she has horrible dreams--and all she wants is for them to stop. Then one night she wakes up inside her dream, in the studio where her dreams are produced! There is even a star who looks just like Julie who plays her in her dreams. With some help from a production assistant named Roman, Julie learns that if she can somehow find the people responsible for producing her dreams, she might be able to make them less scary. But it won't be easy: the tiny tear in the "fabric"of her consciousness that let her fall into the dream studio in the first place is closing fast...and she could be trapped inside her own head forever! Even worse, it turns out that when Julie fell into her dreams, Vivian, the actress who plays Julie in her dreams, escaped into the waking world--and the fake Julie will stop at nothing to take over Julie's life.