Most of the events in Oddballs take place in a large house in an East Coast suburb and in a city nearby. The house seems to have been at least two stories high, have had a veranda overlooking a large backyard, and probably have had a big garden, if the fertilizer on the kitchen table is any guide. The children of the Sleator family seem to have had the full trust of their parents and, consequently, free run of the house. This freedom was tempered by responsibility such as having to change a little brother's diapers, and this fortunate conjunction liberated the children to be creative and to interact with each other with great independence. The children all seem to have learned considerable insight about how to treat people well from their experiences with each other.

The suburb and its schools were the cookie cutter variety prevalent in...