Killing Mr. Griffin

by Lois Duncan Narrated by Dennis Holland

Overview

They only meant to scare him.

Mr. Griffin is the strictest teacher at Del Norte High, with a penchant for endless projects and humiliating his students. Even straight-A student Susan can't believe how mean he is to the charismatic Mark Kinney. So when her crush asks Susan to help a group of students teach a lesson of their own, she goes along. After all, it's a harmless prank, right?

But things don't go according to plan. When one "accident" leads to another, people begin to die. Susan and her friends must face the awful truth: one of them is a killer.

Leave the lights on when reading this classic thriller! This new edition features modernized text and a new introduction by Lois Duncan, the master of teen horror.

A Hachette Audio production.

Editorial Reviews

From the Publisher

Praise for Lois Duncan:
"Lois Duncan is the patron saint of all things awesome."—Jenny Han, New York Times bestselling author of To All the Boys I've Loved Before series

"Lois Duncan has always been one of my biggest inspirations. I gobbled up her novels, reading them again and again and scaring myself over and over. She's a master of suspense, so prepare to be dazzled and spooked!"—Sara Shepard, New York Times bestselling author of the Pretty Little Liars series

"I couldn't be more pleased that Lois Duncan's books will now reach a new generation of readers."—Judy Blume, New York Times bestselling author of Forever and Tiger Eyes

"She knows what you did last summer. She knows how to find that secret evil in her characters' hearts, evil that she turns into throat-clutching suspense in book after book. Does anyone write scarier books than Lois Duncan? I don't think so."—R.L. Stine, New York Times bestselling author of the Goosebump and Fear Street series

"There are a lot of smart authors, and a lot of authors who right reasonably well. Lois Duncan is smart, writes darn good books and is one of the most entertaining authors in America."—Walter Dean Myers, Printz award-winning author of Monster and Dope Sick

"Lois Duncan's books kept me up many a late night reading under the covers with a flashlight!"—Wendy Mass, author of Leap Day and Heaven Looks a Lot Like the Mall

OCT/NOV 99 - AudioFile

In this suspenseful novel, long popular with teenaged readers, a group of high school students kidnaps and threatens an unpopular English teacher--just to give him a good scare--but he really does die. Ed Sala's narration is effective, if uneven. The written dialogue, for the adult characters in particular, is sometimes wooden or unconvincing, posing a challenge for the narrator. Occasionally Sala seems to lose concentration and expression. Some scenes between parent and child come across as reportage, rather than conveying depth of feeling or reflecting their relationship. Nevertheless, young adults will listen to the end. The sense of dread is palpable as the young people sink deeper and deeper into a well of deceit and the tragic consequences of their "prank." D.M.L. © AudioFile, Portland, Maine

Product Details

BN ID:	2940170032600
Publisher:	Hachette Audio
Publication date:	10/05/2010
Edition description:	Unabridged
Sales rank:	1,016,746
Age Range:	12 - 17 Years

Read an Excerpt

"So how does it feel?" Mark was asking in a high, nasal twang, as though he had just been imported from the back hills of the Ozarks.  "How do you like it being on the ground for a change?  It's not so great is it, being down where people can walk on you?  Well, now you know how your students feel all the time."

Mr.  Griffin lay silent.  Only the straining of the tendons in his neck showed that he was conscious and listening.

"Well, how does it feel?" Mark repeated.  "We want an answer.  Did you hear me--sir?"

"Yes, I heard you," Mr. Griffin said shortly.

"Your answer--sir?"

"My answer," Mr.  Griffin said in his cold, clipped voice, "is that if you know what's good for you, you'll untie this rope this instant.  If it's money you're after, I don't have any on me.  I carry a checkbook."

"We don't want your money," David said.  "We're not thieves."

"What are you then?" Mr.  Griffin asked him.  "Besides punks and kidnappers, that is?"

"We are your students, present, past and future," Mark told him, the corner of his mouth twitching slightly with the closest Betsy had ever seen him come to a smile.  "We are representatives of every poor kid who has ever walked into your dungeon of a classroom.  We come to bring you 'the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune.' We're here to deliver revenge."

"If this is a joke," Mr.  Griffin said, "it's not funny.  It's the sort of childish demonstration I'd expect from five-year-olds, not high school seniors.  How many of you are there?"

"A lot," Jeff said.  "Twenty--twenty-five--thirty!"  He glanced at Betsy and grinned.  "Would you believe fifty--a hundred--everybody who's ever had to take a class from you?"

"That's ridiculous.  There can't be more than three of you.  I've only heard three voices.  And all of you are boys."

Mark glanced up at Betsy and nodded.

"Are you sure of that?" she asked, holding her nose as she spoke so that her voice came out as nasal as Mark's had been.  "I'm not a boy.  There are a lot of us girls who hate you too, you know."

Mr.  Griffin gave a start of surprise.  Quite evidently he had not expected this.  "Then there was another car," he said.  "Some of you came in another car."

"There are lots of other cars," Jeff said.  "Dozens of them.  I told you, we're all here.  None of us wanted to miss this."

"Miss what?"

There was a slight pause.  Then Mark said, "Nobody wanted to miss watching you die."

  

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