11/20/14
Sixth Grade Secrets
Louis Sachar

Yes, I am a freshman reading a book about sixth graders. Deal with it.

Sixth Grade Secrets has many different plot lines. However, the main problem revolves about Laura and her club, Pig City, facing off with her enemy, Gabriel's club, Monkey Town. Yes. Those are, the real names of their clubs. Remember, they are only sixth graders.
Pig City is a secret club (since clubs are banned at their school) started by Laura and her friends, based on the words written on the hat that she bought from a garage sale. After initially inviting Gabriel to join her club, they meet up, but immediately don't get along. After angrily leaving her house, he decides to form his own club, inviting all the people that Laura hates. The two clubs go to war (prank wars), lives are lost (shirts are ruined), and lines are crossed (someone gets an illegal haircut).
However, like all sixth grade problems, they eventually come to an end, after about a month.

Dynamic Character- Laura
Laura has extremely long hair, due to the fact that when she was very young, her father promised to let her not cut her hair, if she never lied. And she never did (which is pretty ridiculous, if you ask me). However, towards the end of the book, she realizes that she was only telling half truths most of the time, which, in her case, still counted as lies.
At the beginning, Laura is very rebellious, forming a secret club, and opinionated towards other people. She forces others to give her "insurance", something embarrassing for her to keep in a box, in order to join the club, so that if they ever betray her, she will expose that embarrassing thing to the world. Personally, I think that she is being very selfish and immature about the whole club thing, but I guess she thinks she's being cool.
Her secret is that she is in love with her teacher, Mr. Doyle. This quickly changes after he punishes her for pulling pranks that he had no proof that she pulled (even though she did). This change is also due to the fact that she falls for someone else, someone else her own age, a boy whose name starts with a G... hint hint.

I honestly first read this book when I was in fifth grade, but when you really like a book, it never gets old. As I got older, I realized I had different thoughts towards the book. For example, when I first read it as a fifth grader, I thought it was the coolest book ever, and even wanted to start my own secret club. Now, however, as an older freshman, I can't help but think how stupid their problems are, or how everyone seems to blow everything way out of proportion. I find it quite childish and hilarious when reading it now, but even as a high-schooler, I can't help but think that their sixth grade secrets are nothing like what I have to deal with today.