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Liar, Liar, Pants on Fire.
Gordon Korman. Illustrated by JoAnn Adinolfi. Subject Headings:
Grades 2 - 4 / Ages 7 - 9.
*** /4
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excerpt:
Mrs. Moore touched my arm and looked at me with concern. "Your sweater is soaking wet. What happened?"Up until grade three, Zoe Bent had enjoyed school, but this year is different. "It was hard. And I stunk at most of it." While Zoe perceives her classmates and her younger brother Joey as all being good at something, she sees herself as the "world champion loser" and concludes, "When you're nobody special, the truth needs a little help." Zoe's difficulty is that her stories are always so outrageous that they lead to her being taunted with the title chant, "Liar, liar, pants on fire!" While trying to convince her classmates that she has actually seen an eagle, Zoe constructs a fake aerie in her back yard, one which amazingly attracts an eagle. Unfortunately, Zoe's photographic proof is obscured by her thumb, and her fellow students erupt in yet another round of their hurtful chant. Finally Zoe finds her place when she is befriended by Michael Rothman, the quietest boy in class, who, having experienced the Bents' "nuclear toilet," believes her and shows Zoe her talent: "You have the greatest imagination in the history of the third grade.""Oh," I said, "I got my sleeve caught in the nuclear toilet."
The whole class gasped.
Mrs. Moore's eyes shot sparks. "Zoe Bent, how many times have we spoken about you making up wild stories?"
Aimed at a much younger audience than Korman has normally written for in the past, this first chapter book is principally a light character study. Though the theme is dealt with somewhat heavy-handedly, Liar, Liar is an acceptable read but not Korman at his best as when he is writing for the middle school crowd.
Recommended.
Dave Jenkinson teaches courses in children's and adolescent literature at the Faculty of Education, the University of Manitoba.
To comment on this title or this review, send mail to cm@umanitoba.ca.
Copyright © 1998 the Manitoba Library Association.
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TABLE OF CONTENTS FOR THIS ISSUE - APRIL 24, 1998.
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ISSN 1201-9364