What's in a Name - Hardcover

Wittlinger, Ellen

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 068982551X ISBN 13: 9780689825514

Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing, 2000

Synopsis

As if the students of Scrub Harbor High don't have enough to worry about: Christine is quickly losing her friend Georgie to Ricardo; Nelson can't connect with Shaquanda; Adam's role as the new kid is tougher than he thought; and O'Neill's controversial poem has electrified the school while making life unbearable for his football-star brother, Quincy. But now a group of Scrub Harbor citizens are trying to change the town's name to the "classier" Folly Bay, and their crusade has filtered down to their kids. Suddenly, the school is divided into the rich-kid "Follys" and the poorer "Scrubs," with everyone else caught in the middle. How can you answer the question "Who am I?" when your town can't even make tip its mind? Will anyone emerge from the battle intact? In ten interlocking stories, Ellen Wittlinger addresses the rarely discussed issues of class and identity that inform so much of teenage life. What's in a Name is a bold report from the cutting edge ofteenage concerns.

About this title

About the Author

Ellen Wittlinger is the critically acclaimed author of the teen novels Love & Lies: Marisol's Story, Parrotfish, Blind Faith, Sandpiper, Heart on My Sleeve, Zigzag, The Long Night of Leo and Bree, Razzle, What's in a Name, and Hard Love (an American Library Association Michael L. Printz Honor Book and a Lambda Literary Award winner), and the middle-grade novel Gracie's Girl. She has a bachelor's degree from Millikin University in Decatur, Illinois, and an M.F.A. from the University of Iowa. A former children's librarian, she lives with her husband in Haydenville, Massachusetts.

From School Library Journal

Grade 7 Up-A subtle and completely realistic novel told in multiple voices. What starts out as a quest to change a small town's name turns into personal journeys of self-discovery for 10 teens. The ongoing debate about which name is best for the town, Scrub Harbor or Folly Bay, lightly overlays the main story line, while the characters struggle to hold their lives together and figure out who they really are. One boy faces the fact that he is gay and chooses to "come out" via a poem published in the school literary magazine, while his football-star jock of an older brother is forced to deal with being irrevocably linked to his brother. An angry girl thaws with the help of a Brazilian exchange student, who in turn realizes that the language barrier helps rather than hinders his understanding of humans in general, and himself in particular. A transferring senior realizes that he isn't the popular boy he used to be at his old school, and must reinvent himself to find his place in Scrub Harbor. The fact that these teens are all struggling to find out who they are, and that everybody is constantly in flux, becomes the main theme that links all of these seemingly unconnected narrative threads together. The teenagers are compelling, and there's more depth to them and the story than readers might expect from the simplistic title.
Linda Bindner, formerly at Athens Clarke County Library, GA
Copyright 2000 Reed Business Information, Inc.

About this edition

• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing
• Publication date: 2000
• ISBN 10: 068982551X
• ISBN 13: 9780689825514
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 160
• Illustrator: Mathias John