The Off Season (Hardcover)

~ Catherine Murdock (Author)
Key Phrases: turkey guys, turkey farmers, Red Bend, Eau Claire, Paul Zorn (more...)

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Starred Review. Grade 7–10—This sequel to Murdock's Dairy Queen (Houghton, 2006) catches readers up with narrator D.J. Schwenk as she hits her stride in her junior year of high school. She's playing linebacker for her high school football team, hanging out with Brian (the rival high school's quarterback), earning passing grades, and pulling her weight on her family's struggling dairy farm. But "a whole herd of trouble" is coming her way. First, D.J. and, by extension, Brian become the unwitting subjects of a People magazine article. Then D.J. suffers a shoulder injury that threatens her sports career, her gay best friend runs away with an older girlfriend, and D.J. notices that Brian isn't too keen on being seen with her in public. These problems are all put into perspective when D.J.'s older brother, Win, suffers a serious spinal-cord injury during a college football game. D.J. stays by his side in the hospital, a task made even tougher by Win's refusal to communicate, and accompanies him to rehab in Minnesota. There's no too-tidy ending here; readers gain a sense of the wait-and-see and grueling nature of physical rehabilitation. Though not as laugh-out-loud funny as the earlier title, The Off Season depicts a believably maturing D.J., a young woman whose character shines through even as she struggles to find her voice. Readers will root for her at every tragicomic turn, and will hope to hear from her again in future novels.—Amy Pickett, Ridley High School, Folsom, PA
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.

From Booklist

This funny, touching follow-up to Dairy Queen (2006), a 2007 Best Book for Young Adults, succeeds whether read on its own or as a sequel. D. J.'s junior year starts off promisingly: she has finally been accepted as a valuable player on the football team, and Brian Nelson, quarterback for a rival school, is still coming around to see her. Storm clouds gather, though, as her close friend is bullied for being gay, money problems on the farm increase, and an injury forces D. J. to choose between football and basketball, which could net her a college scholarship. She also begins to wonder why Brian makes out with her but never wants to take her anywhere. Then brother Winn is seriously injured on the football field, forcing her to gain some much-needed perspective. D. J. is an easygoing, likable narrator, full of self-deprecating humor and insight, and her struggles, whether they are everyday or life altering, will resonate with teen audiences. Krista Hutley
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

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Product Details

• Reading level: Young Adult
  
• Hardcover: 288 pages
• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Books for Children (June 4, 2007)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0618686959
• ISBN-13: 978-0618686957
• Product Dimensions: 8.2 x 5.8 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 1 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 4.7 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (16 customer reviews)
• Amazon.com Sales Rank: #88,356 in Books (See Bestsellers in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

9 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Serves up surprising twists while staying true to life, June 27, 2007

By	Teenreads.com (New York, NY) - See all my reviews

D.J. Schwenk spends Labor Day at the neighbors' picnic, eating and playing a baseball game so funny that she literally falls down laughing. But the family's cows must be milked and fed, so the Schwenks leave early to tend to their dairy farm chores. At home Brian Nelson shows up, to D.J.'s delight. Brian helps with the cows, he and D.J. discuss their last football game (they play on opposing teams), and then there's a little awkward shuffling as he prepares to leave. D.J. remembers how they botched their one attempt to make out as Brian takes off.



When school starts, D.J. discovers that she is no longer invisible, thanks to the fact that she's the only girl on the football team. However, D.J. doesn't like the attention; she joined the squad to prove to herself that she was unique, not to become public property.



D.J. is thrilled when Brian calls to ask her to ride with him to Minneapolis over the weekend. But she turns him down for Saturday because her brothers play college football. Watching the games with her family is more important than anything else, so she's relieved when Brian suggests a Sunday trip. Their excursion ends with kissing so inflammatory that D.J. suddenly understands how easy it would be to "Do Anything Stupid" (which her mother constantly warns her against).



To her amazement, D.J. learns that the paparazzi are after her story. She doesn't want people accusing her of being a linebacker to get publicity. But maybe those reporters from People won't show up after all...



Meanwhile, kids at school begin hassling D.J.'s best friend Amber because of Amber's girlfriend. Amber starts cutting school, which is a total bummer for D.J. Next, D.J. is benched for "bullying" when she was actually defending a kid from a real bully.



Can things go even more downhill? Certainly. D.J. grapples with the secret knowledge of her family's financial situation, impossible decisions that challenge her loyalties, physical pain and romantic confusion --- not to mention a whole load of humiliation. And then something happens that is so earth-shattering that it puts all her other trials into perspective.



Catherine Gilbert Murdock's characters are so real, I wouldn't be surprised to bump into one of them at the grocery store. There is not a stereotype to be found among the cast --- from the brilliant, good-with-little-kids younger brother to Amber and her barbecuing girlfriend Dale. And how refreshing it is to have a large, tall female main character who is in love but also plays football, roofs sheds, struggles with schoolwork and would never yearn to be a size 2.



The pace is lively, and the plot serves up surprising twists while staying true to life. As much as I enjoyed the first half of the book, once I hit the gut-twisting middle, I just could not put it down. THE OFF SEASON is a total winner, fulfilling the promise of the first installment of D.J.'s tale, DAIRY QUEEN. Dare we hope for a third?



--- Reviewed by Terry Miller Shannon ([e-mail])

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Awesome series - Funny, sad, smart and everything in between, March 25, 2009

By	Bookworm100 (Hawaii) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Off Season (Paperback)

I'm 37 years old and I'll read any age level as long as it's good. This is great. I love D.J. She's tough and decent and has a hilarious inner voice and is just a genuinely great person. At times she's given almost too much for a teenager to handle but she does it because there's no one else and at their core Schwenks go out there and get the job done.

But what's really great about DJ is that she's not perfect. She gets angry and resentful and bottles up her feelings and shoves her foot in her mouth and thinks selfish thoughts. In other words she's a real, relatable person. Her family and the supporting characters are all vividly drawn and believable. No one's a villain and no one's perfect, just like real life. These books made me snicker and they made me cry and they made me smile about remembering the feeling of first love.

I really recommend both Dairy Queen and The Off Season and I'm planning to send them to my nieces pronto because DJ's a pretty awesome role model.

1 of 1 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A similarly great sequel , October 6, 2008

By	H. A. Janahi "MJ" - See all my reviews (REAL NAME)

This review is from: The Off Season (Paperback)

When DJ Schwenck got to join the Red Bend boy's football team, when she and Brian got together, and when she was finally able to "talk," she thought that all of her problems were simple solved. But once, while in practice, DJ hurt self and had to decide whether football was worth ruining her future for. Then Brian started acting all weird when they were together in public, and her older brother, Win, got hurt really bad during a football game. That's when DJ steps up, once again, to take all those burdens on her already-injured shoulders.

I thought Murdock's Dairy Queen, was the best coming-of-age-story I have ever read. Turns out, the off season is a progression of DJ's coming-of-age that started in the first book. Though containing a more no-nonsense tone than the previous book, it still contains numerous laugh-out-loud scenes, not because the situation is funny but simply because DJ says it as it is. Like the first book, this too is authentic, and Murdock strongly established that fact in its ending, it wasn't all happy-go-lucky, but then again it wasn't a sad one either. But rather well balanced, some people might not like the way DJ and Brian's relationship turned out to be, but I guess that also was realistic. What are you waiting for? Do yourself a favor and get this book, it simply is amazing.