The Best Night of Your (Pathetic) Life
-
- $11.99
-
- $11.99
Publisher Description
An all-day scavenger hunt in the name of eternal small-town glory
With only a week until graduation, there's one last thing Mary and her friends must do together: participate in the Oyster Point High Official Unofficial Senior Week Scavenger Hunt. And Mary is determined to win.
Mary lost her spot at Georgetown to self-professed "it" bully Jake Barbone, and she's not about to lose again. But everyone is racing for the finish line with complicated motives, and the team's all-night adventure becomes all-night drama as shifting alliances, flared tempers, and crushing crushes take over. As the items and points pile up, Mary and her team must reinvent their strategy--and themselves--in order to win.
PUBLISHERS WEEKLY
A week before graduation, seniors at Oyster Point High compete in an unauthorized scavenger hunt with the prize being custodianship of a garden yeti that they keep for a year. Mary May Gilhooley is intent on breaking out of her good-girl shackles to win, but she has to contend with friction among her teammates, self-dubbed "the Also-Rans": Harvard-bound Patrick, who is head over heels in (unrequited) love with Mary; mysteriously sullen best friend Winter; and barely closeted Dez, who has been picked on for years by a rival team. The objects in the hunt include many straightforward items (one "al dente" strand of spaghetti, a bar of hotel soap) and others that must be puzzled out ("Shave Bob's balls" "Shuck a Mary on the half shell"). It's a terrific premise, and Altebrando (Dreamland Social Club) successfully sustains a sense of tension and excitement throughout. In the final pages, Mary swings a bit unbelievably between acquiescent daughter and win-at-all-costs team leader, but that doesn't diminish the book's smart combination of end-of-high-school poignancy and fun. Ages 14 up.
