Viola, Furgy, Bobbi, and Me [Library Binding]

Kenneth E. Ethridge (Author)

Book Description

Age Level: 11 and up

Three teenaged friends try to protect Viola, a wealthy seventy-eight-year-old baseball fan, from her abusive daughters who want to commit Viola to a nursing home.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 6-9-- Ninth-grader Stephen White's desire to torment his younger sister leads him to doing yard work for senior citizen Viola Spencer. When he finds that Viola is, like him, an avid Detroit Tigers fan, friendship develops. He introduces his girlfriend, Bobbi, and his rather eccentric friend, Furgy, to Viola, and they become a foursome. This sensitive account of Stephen's friendship and his growing awareness of the plight of the elderly is marred by several elements. The characterizations of Viola's evil daughters who go to dastardly measures in an attempt to get their mother's money are one-dimensional and unbelievable. The inclusion of Furgy's mother's suicide and his father's alcoholism are not developed, but rather serve to make the ending a very pat one: Furgy can move in with Viola, finding a home for himself and helping to care for her. One has to swallow lots of slapstick humor, jokes of the school lunch variety, and seemingly endless repetitions of "dude," "babe," "dork," "geek," and "man" to get to the special relationship between Stephen and Viola. --Connie Tyrrell Burns, Mahoney Middle School, South Portland, Maine
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Product Details

• Reading level: Ages 11 and up
  
• Library Binding: 164 pages
• Publisher: Holiday House; 1st edition (April 1989)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0823407462
• ISBN-13: 978-0823407460
• Product Dimensions: 8.3 x 5.4 x 0.7 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.8 ounces
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #5,631,650 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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