Book Is a "Hoot"
April 5, 2006By JEAN WESTMOORE, NeXt Editor
The Buffalo News
"Hoot" by Carl Hiaasen is the NeXt Book Club's book choice for spring.
As the story begins, a boy named Roy Eberhardt has just moved from Montana to Coconut Grove, Fla., and bully Dana Matherson is giving him a pounding on the bus ride to Trace Middle School.
But having his face squashed into the bus window isn't all bad -- Roy notices a boy running, and the boy isn't running toward school. Roy's interest in the running boy lands him in a wild environmental adventure, pitting middle school kids against developers who want to build a pancake house on land that is home to small endangered owls.
(You might think of owls roosting in high places, but the owls in "Hoot" (the scientific name is Athene cunicularia) nest in holes in the ground.
And the kids will do just about anything to save them. Appeals to government agencies haven't worked, so the running boy comes up with other ways to fight off Mother Paula's All-American Pancake House, whether it means snakes, alligators or a can of black paint.
"Hoot" (available in paperback from Knopf, $8.95) is the first children's book from Hiaasen, a Florida native who writes a column for the Miami Herald and has written many books for adults.
His second book for kids is also an environmental mystery. In "Flush," kids use purple dye to prove that a gambling boat is illegally dumping sewage into the ocean at night.
The timing is right for the book; "Hoot" comes out as a movie later this month.
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JOIN THE CLUB: This is your chance to read a great book, write a short review and have it published in NeXt. To be part of the NeXt Book Club, all you do is read "Hoot," write your review (150 words maximum) and e-mail it to next@buffnews.com by April 30. (This will give you something to do over spring vacation!) Or if you see the movie, write a short review of the movie and compare it to the book.
Or mail the review to: NeXt Book Club/Buffalo News/P.O. Box 100/ Buffalo, N.Y. 14240. IMPORTANT: Include your name, age, home address (include town and zip code), phone number and school. We'll print a few of the most interesting reviews in NeXt. Those who send reviews will be eligible for a random drawing for NeXt T-shirts and books.
