The American boys' private school has had a bad press in recent times. John Knowles's A Separate Peace and Robert Cormier's The Chocolate War uncovered tensions and animosities of peculiar cruelty. Nat Hentoff's Alcott School [in This School Is Driving Me Crazy] is seen from a more comic standpoint, but the plot still turns upon bullying and extortion in the corridors and cloakrooms.
Sam Davidson is amusingly scatter-brained, highly articulate, given to thoughtless horsing around and basically a good kid; as is the way of many post-[Paul] Zindel heroes in American novels….
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