Roy Eberhart had just moved to the small, wooded suburbs of Florida, and was not very skilled in the area of fitting in at school.  He had already gotten into a fight with the school bully, Dana Matherson, was threatened by Beatrice the Bear, and managed to destroy his bike all in the same day. However, this Monday was different.

“Roy would not have noticed the strange boy if it weren’t for Dana Matherson, because Roy ordinarily didn’t look out the window of the bus. It was then, squinting through the smudged glass, that Roy spotted the strange boy running along the sidewalk.” (p.1)

         Roy was very intrigued by “Mullet Fingers,” or the running boy, as Roy called him. As Roy followed this boy endlessly, he found out a secret about the running boy and Beatrice Leep. The three of them joined together as a team for one cause, to prevent a pancake house from destroying the homes of over twenty owls, and the Mother Paula’s All-American Pancake House chain was not too happy about it. In this book, one fight was enough to bring three unlikely friends together, while tearing the pancake house apart and saving a few endangered animals.

“It’s about greedy developers, corrupt politicians, clueless cops and middle-school screwballs of all persuasions. You don’t have to be a young adult to enjoy it.”
–The New York Times Book Review

         “Mullet Fingers” distracted and discouraged Mother Paula’s site-workers that were trying, with little luck, to build a pancake house. However, this was not all. Not only did the running boy succeed in getting the project delayed, but also made sure that it was permanently put to an end. From snakes, to spray painting a cop car, this boy knew every which way of getting this pancake house eliminated, and almost had permanently injured himself in the process. In this book, a theme that was well illustrated was standing up for what you believe in and working to make that possible.

         “The Mother Paula mission was simply too risky; somebody or something would be waiting. The attack dogs might be gone, but the company wasn’t about to leave the pancake house location unguarded. Yet [Roy] couldn’t stop thinking ahead to the day when the owl dens would be destroyed by bulldozers. He could picture the mother owls and father owls, helplessly flying in circles while their babies were being smothered under tons of dirt.”(p.180)

         As the pancake house mission was forming, Roy had some other problems of his own, caused by the worst bully in the school, Dana Matherson. Since Dana had been the school bully for a while, he knew how to frighten the new students. However, after getting punched in the nose by Roy, Dana had not come to school for the past week. Even though the punch was in self- defense, Roy’s parents still wanted him to apologize, and this idea seemed not only unfair, but a little scary as well. Nonetheless, Roy stood up for himself and told Dana very openly about how he felt.  For Roy, this was the best form of self-confidence that he had ever shown.  This illustrated another resounding theme throughout the book, which was to confront your problems with courage.

Good writing makes you think about your life and life experiences. Most people want to save the world from hunger, war, and tragedy all at once. Unfortunately, this is not always feasible or remotely possible. You are often left with the ability to make a small difference and hope that that difference will be important.  The main characters in this novel were starting in one place, by saving endangered owls.  They were making a profound difference in the world, even though they were only taking one small step at a time.  My family and I did something similar when we agreed to sponsor a young girl named Andrea from South America. She is now seven years old, and for the past five years, we have helped to support her and her family through an agency that works in Brazil. Saving one child’s life may not seem as ambitious as saving an endangered species, but my family and I decided that this was what we could do in our little part of the world. We have watched Andrea grow through letters and pictures, and are confident that we made the right choice for us in our attempt to make the world a better place one little girl at a time.  

The plot in Hoot was intriguing and original, and the characters were well described. As the characters’ pictures found a place in your imagination, the details describing the setting and the actions in the book were hilarious. This book was not only for young readers, but for adults as well. Therefore, I gave this book a rating of three out of three stars, and recommend it to readers, juvenile and adult. It is a rare find to have an entertaining and imaginative book that deals with important issues like social responsibility and courage.

 “It seems unlikely that the master of noir-tinged, surrealistic black humor would write a novel for young readers. And, yet, there has always been something delightfully juvenile about Hiaasen’s imagination; beneath the bent cynicism lurks a distinctly 12-year-old cackle.”
–Booklist 

Kate     October 2005