Wringer | Plot Summary

Wringer Overview

Wringer is about peer pressure. Palmer LaRue dreads his upcoming tenth birthday.

In his town, Family Fest is a yearly fundraiser that ends with an annual pigeon shoot, when entrants gun down five thousand live pigeons. Ten-year-old boys are "wringers."

It is their task to break the necks of wounded pigeons. Palmer is horrified by the event but convinces himself for several years that the pigeons are better off. He and his friend, Dorothy Gruzik, avoid the pigeon shoot, sometimes playing on the swings well away from the shooting field and other times staying away from the park on that day. But as Palmer's tenth birthday approaches he wants to join a gang led by Beans, whose whole purpose in life, since age four, has been to become a wringer.

Palmer gains acceptance in the gang and is nicknamed "Snots." He learns to join...
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