Overview
Rex Zero’s family is moving—again—this time to a different school district, and his old friends will probably forget he even exists. What’s more, a trio of bullies is out to get him. Rex’s wild and funny adventures continue as he stumbles into seventh grade, pretending to be someone he’s not, and using his overactive imagination to resolve one of life’s most vexing problems: just when everything is going well, why does it have to change?
Editorials
From the Publisher
* “Genuinely wholesome, packed with affectionate humor, tension and joy.” —Kirkus Reviews, starred review“Wynne-Jones’s gift for understatement, intelligent humor, and sharp characterization serves this third (and best) installment well as Rex must handle many issues of growing up” —The Horn Book
“The humor of Rex’s first-person narration does not diminish Wynne-Jones’s ability to deal with tough issues candidly, and the resolution fully satisfies. This title does stand alone, but it will be most appreciated in libraries where Rex already has a strong following.” —School Library Journal
Children's Literature -
In his third adventure, twelve-year-old Rex and his friends are excited about moving up to the middle school in the fall. Then Rex learns that his family is moving again, for the eighth time. The new house is just across town, but he will have to change schools. So he and his friends devise a secret plan. Rex will let his parents think he changed schools, but he will secretly attend the other one with his friends. While the plan works for awhile, the truth is soon discovered. In the meantime, both Rex and his sister Annie must deal with bullies who make their lives miserable. Rex follows Annie's example to punish a bully only to discover that revenge is not always the answer. Although the novel is set in the 1960s, young readers will easily identify with Rex and his friends. Quite humorous in places, this short novel deals honestly with issues confronting young people. Reviewer: Shirley NelsonSchool Library Journal
Gr 5–8—When Rex Zero finds out that his family is moving yet again, he is devastated. Although the move is only across town, it means that he will start middle school at Connaught instead of at Hopewell with James, Buster, and Kathy. The four friends decide that regardless of the Ottawa City Council's views on zoning, Rex should attend Hopewell as planned. His records have already been sent over there, and when he offers to take his enrollment paperwork to the new school for his mother, she gratefully accepts: the chores of moving households and raising a family of eight are exhausting. In 1963, it is easy enough for the boy to make his enrollment paperwork disappear and to use the crosstown buses to get to Hopewell. The deception is successful for a while, but Rex learns in the process how taxing the life of a pretender can be. Complicating matters are a budding romance with one of his classmates, threats from a bully and his sidekicks, and a secret laboratory experiment that his older sister is conducting in the back shed. Family dynamics and friendships are skillfully fleshed out, with fully developed characters to whom readers will readily relate. The humor of Rex's first-person narration does not diminish Wynne-Jones's ability to deal with tough issues candidly, and the resolution fully satisfies. This title does stand alone, but it will be most appreciated in libraries where Rex already has a strong following.—Kim Dare, Fairfax County Public Schools, VAKirkus Reviews
After a childhood spent moving constantly across two countries, Rex wonders why his parents can't settle down. At least this time, Rex and his seven siblings are only moving to the other side of Ottawa. He'll still be switching to a new school, though, which means leaving Kathy, James and Buster at the beginning of grade seven. Rex has a cunning plan: He volunteers to arrange the transfer paperwork as a favor to his exhausted mum and then simply doesn't do it. Sure, he'll spend every scrounged penny on buses, but it'll be worth it. Right? Then why does his life feel so complicated? He's the target of a hockey-playing bully, sister Annie Oakley's cooking up something evil in the garden shed and Mum's acting funny. This 1963 pre-adolescence presents an imperfect world with flaws Rex is just barely beginning to understand. Rex as a narrator is fully in his time: Penny loafers, Hardy Boys novels and gender inequity are all seen through his utterly contemporaneous, completely ingenuous eyes. Genuinely wholesome, packed with affectionate humor, tension and joy. (Historical fiction. 9-12)