What Boys Really Want

by Pete Hautman

Overview

National Book Award winning author Pete Hautman lets us in on the secret.Lita is the writer. Adam is the entrepreneur. They are JUST FRIENDS.So Adam would never sell copies of a self-help book before he'd even written it. And Lita would never try to break up Adam's relationship with Blair, the skankiest girl at school. They'd never sabotage their friends Emily and Dennis. Lita would never date a guy related to a girl she can't stand. They'd never steal each other's blog posts. And Adam would never end up in a fist fight with Lita's boyfriend. Nope, never.Adam and Lita might never agree on what happened, but in this hilarious story from Pete Hautman, they manage to give the world a little more insight into what boys and girls are really looking for.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780545393195
Publisher:	Scholastic, Inc.
Publication date:	01/01/2012
Sold by:	Scholastic, Inc.
Format:	eBook
Pages:	304
Lexile:	710L (what's this?)
File size:	2 MB
Age Range:	12 - 17 Years

About the Author

Pete Hautman won the National Book Award for his novel Godless. He is also the author of the acclaimed novels The Big Crunch, How to Steal a Car, Rash, Invisible, Sweetblood, Hole in the Sky, No Limit, and Mr. Was. His home in the world is Minnesota, and his home on the web is www.petehautman.com.

Editorial Reviews

Gr 8–11—Best friends since kindergarten, Adam and Lita are now high school juniors. While Lita anonymously runs a sassy advice blog as "Miz Fitz," Adam hatches a plan to write a book about how boys and girls really think. With more advance orders from girls than guys, he decides to cater to his buying audience by focusing on what boys really want. He uses Lita's blog as his main source for research, borrowing liberally from his friend without realizing it. Aspiring author Lita grows envious of Adam's literary pursuits, so she turns her attention to helping her other BFF, Emily, lure mutual pal Dennis's attention away from new girl Blair. The plot thickens when Emily warms up to Adam, and Lita falls for a university student whom she spies getting into a car with… Blair. As a supporting character observes, "You just never know who will hook up" (though the hook-ups are G-rated and sexual references are mild). Things come to a boil when Adam throws himself a book publication party, and Lita discovers that he's plagiarized her blog. The book moves along at a snappy pace, with chapters alternating between the main characters' points of view. Chapters open with Miz Fitz's advice or excerpts from Adam's book; these humorous snippets ring true. The novel's tone may remind readers of the snarky but sweet movie Easy A, or Don Calame's equally funny Beat the Band (Candlewick, 2010). This is fresh, realistic YA fiction at its best.—Amy Pickett, Ridley High School, Folsom, PA

School Library Journal

Hautman (The Big Crunch) demonstrates the gulf between male and female perspectives by alternating between the first-person narratives of high school juniors Adam and Lita, whose friendship is put through the wringer thanks to miscommunication, jealousy, and plagiarism. When Adam decides to write a book about what boys want and how they think, it drives a wedge between him and Lita, with Lita annoyed that Adam is trampling on her dream of becoming a writer (the very idea that he write an advice book was hers to begin with). But Adam discovers that writing a book is harder than he thought, so he ends up stealing content from the Web, including Lita’s snarky, anonymous dating-advice blog. When Adam self-publishes his book, their conflict explodes. Hautman captures the angst, awkwardness, and joy of crushes and first dates with humor and heart, as Adam, Lita, and their friends fumble their way into relationships. Despite Adam’s overall haplessness, he gets one thing right: “Nearly all problems between the sexes can be boiled down to one thing: mistaken assumptions.” Hautman proves this to be true again and again. Ages 13–18. Agent: Flannery Literary. (Jan.)

Publishers Weekly

Praise for The Big Crunch:* "Hautman skillfully subverts clichés in this subtle, authentic, hearttuggingexploration of first love, but his sharp-eyed view of high-school social dynamics and the lovingfriction between parents and teens on the edge of independence is just as memorable." - Booklist, starred review"With not a bell or whistle in sight, Hautman manages to write the YA love story of all time: simple, poignant, and very, very real." - VOYA"A humorous and bittersweet tale of romance and the convoluted, uncertain paths that bring two people together." - Kirkus ReviewsPraise for How to Steal a Car:* “A sporty, stylish model with peppy acceleration and surprising traction, this will be a sweet ride for readers” – BCCB, starred review“A sharply observed, subversive coming-of-age tale.” - Kirkus Reviews

From the Publisher

High-school student Adam Merchant is writing a small volume on what boys and girls really want, an irresistible topic for his classmates. It takes him a whole month to write it, but lifting much of the information from a Miz Fitz advice-column blog makes the work go much faster. When finished, the $10 self-published work becomes so popular it attracts the attention of a real publisher. Little does Adam know that his on-and-off-again friend Lita Wold is Miz Fitz, who's not thrilled when she realizes that Adam has stolen her words. Told in Adam's and Lita's alternating voices, this is 300-plus pages of tedious teen banter over what boys and girls really think, plus a disappointingly mind-numbing subplot that finds Dennis liking Blair while Lita thinks he ought to like Emily, and other high-school drama. Originally, as explained in the acknowledgments, Hautman was to write Adam's part, and a female writer was going to write Lita's part, but the project was dropped when it became no longer fun. Years later, the project was revived, but it's still not fun, though it has its moments of humor and will certainly appeal to teen readers looking for an easy read and cheap thrills. A title that ought to be as appealing as the book Adam publishes but isn't; Hautman is capable of far better. (Fiction. 13-17)

Kirkus Reviews