Games

by Carol Gorman

Mick Sullivan likes reading thrillers, daydreaming about Tabitha Slater, and teasing his archenemy, Boot Quinn.

Boot Quinn likes playing his guitar, daydreaming about Tabitha Slater, and punching his adversary, Mick Sullivan.

The two eighth graders are rivals in every way, and with two fights in the first week of school, they've set the stage for a yearlong showdown. That is, until a new principal arrives on the scene and forces Mick and Boot to spend an hour and a half each day playing games together. Two enemies, one small room, and no adult supervision—battle lines are bound to be crossed.

As the wins and losses are tallied, the boys find themselves fighting for their classmates' attention, a cute girl's affection, and their own fathers' respect.

But how far are they willing to go to win? And who are they really fighting?

There's only one way to find out.

Game on.

Genres: Young Adult, Contemporary, Middle Grade, School, Realistic Fiction

288 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 2007

About the author

Carol Gorman is an Iowa-born writer of over 40 published books. She spent 17 years teaching in middle-school, high-school, and college classes. Her writing time has been devoted to creating mystery and suspense novels for children.

She originally aspired to be an actress, and while studying at the University of Iowa, was cast in the lead of both West Side Story and Peter Pan. In the 1980s, Carol married writer Edward Gorman, who inspired her to write. She conducts writers’ workshops at elementarys, middle schools and high schools, and enjoys talking to students about writing and publishing.

Reviews

[Madelyn Rose · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book was fine. I didn't love it, but I didn't hate it either. There were things that I enjoyed, and things that I didn't like too much.

Things I liked:

1. The book had a cool cover. I know the cover doesn't and shouldn't reflect my opinion on the book (and it didn't), but it was just something I enjoyed. It really reflected the book well and really expressed the rivalry in the book.

2. The book seemed pretty relatable because of the fighting because everyone (probably) develops a rivalry or some enemy at one point or another so it was good reading about something that I could easily relate to.

Neutral ThoughtS:

1. It was interesting, and I was always on my toes to see how the boys would feel while playing the games. Sometimes it was a negative overall effect and sometimes it was positive. This is why I believe that this was a neutral aspect because some parts I liked and some I did not.

Things I didn't like:

1. The boys didn't have strong personalities, so it was hard to tell who was speaking in the "alternate personalities" and I found myself continually going back to "check my facts" in the book.

For these reasons, I gave this book three stars. Overall, pretty good read but not my favorite book. Happy Reading!

-Madelyn

[lisa · Rating 5 out of 5]

I generally like children's and young adult books, but I go in with the expectation that they will be a cute and moderately entertaining diversion. However, when reading these genres, I find that I am often very pleasantly surprised by the depth of the characters and the ingenuous, insightful telling of what can only be considered a profound story. Such was the case with this book. Games is an interesting look into the minds, perspectives, and motives of two "bullies" who enjoy nothing more than picking on and humiliating each other. (Well, nothing except for perhaps Tabitha Slater's brilliant, brace-filled smile....) I was captured by the story immediately, and found that I had trouble putting the book down every evening and was wondering throughout the following day what would happen next to poor Mick and Boot. My only wish is that there was a more satisfying resolution in the boys' home lives by the end of the story. You're left wondering if and how it will all turn out for them. (Art mimics life, I suppose....) What IS clear in the end, however, is that their lives are richer, fuller, and just plain better for having gotten to know each other.

[Isel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Okay, so Iiked the book but I have a problem with it.
Why didn't Boot get a happy ending?
I love Mick and I'm very happy he got his happy ending. A new (NICE) girl he likes, he didn't get in trouble for what he did to the library (in all honesty he deserved some punishment for that), his mom and him finally decided to leave his dad who didn't deserve them. I'm very happy with Mick's ending so the problem is why didn't Boot get a similar ending? Instead he gets that girl Tabitha who does NOT deserve him, he's still living with his dad and brother who I know will probably treat him good for a week maybe a month if he's lucky before getting back to mistreating him, and it wasn't made clear if he was able to repair his friendship with Jesse and his dad.
Why does one have a better ending then the other one?
Also... They broke my heart near the end. I was crying. I was so happy to see that although they're not exactly friends (yet) Mick still defended Boots.
Love both characters and their story.

[Erin Mackay · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book took me back to my middle school years, where there was so much unnecessary drama and fighting because 13 and 14-year-olds are weird.
These boys don’t even have a good reason to be fighting. Mick thinks it’s entertaining to make Boot react and Boot thinks that Mick is stuck up. It’s a dynamic that doesn’t work and the new principal puts them together to play games and it goes about as well as you would think.
There’s quite a bit of illegal activity in this book as well. Boot smokes, they dare each other to commit crimes, though not dangerous crimes, but crimes nonetheless. Which I was not expecting.
The boys also deal with a lot in their home lives to the point where cops are nearly called and frankly, they should have been.
This is a quick read and I had a good time for the most part, even cried a bit towards the end so the emotions are there for sure. I’d recommend to kids in middle school and early high schoolers for sure.

[Jdtolbert2003yahoo.com · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed seeing the story from both sides. Mick & Boot both have uncertain home lives. They pick fights with each other. Something supported by their fathers. As a way to get the boys to learn a little more about each other the new principal has them play games at school. After a dare for each of them go horribly wrong they both realize something about themselves and each other.

The characters were real and enjoyable to read about. I liked this story a lot

[Greta · Rating 5 out of 5]

I love this book, I love boots especially, I feel like micks life ended up ok and Boots was trashed. I cried so hard when we figure out that boots was abused by his dad, (it gave me misunderstood bad guy vibes which I love) I hate that he was hit so hard that he couldn’t hear. It hurt my soul in the best way.

[Ray Robinson · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great book about two boys who can't get along and the struggles they have at school and at home. It is surprising what you can learn about someone while playing a game.

[Ruth Ellen · Rating 2 out of 5]

It's not BAD, it was just... not really my thing.

(I also feel it was kinda misbranded? The cover felt like it was gonna be video game-y/superhero-y, and it definitely wasn't.

[Ashley Potter · Rating 5 out of 5]

Good game 🎮

[Toriin]

yawn

[Evan Ferguson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Very good book. Would recommend it to anyone in junior high -- high school.

[Jennifer Sommer · Rating 3 out of 5]

Two middle school boys have an affinity for getting into fights with each other to the point where school mates are taking bets against them. “Boots” doesn’t like Mick because of his perceived superiority complex. Mick doesn’t hate Boots; he just can’t resist the opportunity to instigate fights with him. Following the latest fight, the new principal, rather than suspending them, requires the two to play games together every day for several hours through lunch. The fights escalate to “dares”. Mick is dared to throw paint on the library and statues in front of it…of particular and sentimental meaning to him, an avid reader. Boots is dared to steal something from the music store owned by a man who treats Boots better than his abusive father. Both boys regret the dares but must live with the repercussions. Will the games allow the boys to work through their differences, or will the fights become more than they can handle? Full of heartbreak and betrayal, this realistic tale will give middle school readers something to ponder.

[Alex Blose · Rating 5 out of 5]

Boot and Mick despise each other. After getting suspended a number of times and getting in trouble at school, the new principal comes up with a new solution to try and resolve the issues between the boys. Everyday for over an hour, the two boys must go to the "game room" and play board games while they are there. Crazy idea, right? Well, Mr. Maddox, the principal, thinks it is the perfect solution and he decides to give it a go.

During their time in the "game room", the boys continue to battle things out, but this time over some different issues, such as the cute girl with braces, Tabitha. The boys also participate in a dare game, which gets them into some deep trouble, and discover an underground tunnel in the school. While getting to learn about each other in the game room, the boys learn about each others lives and realize that underlying issues at home are what is really causing the issues between the boys and they begin to see through the light and come together to help one another out.

I really liked this book. It was so realistic that I felt as if this was something that could have happened while I was in middle school. The issues of bullying, trying to impress girls, and alcoholic and abusive parents are things that continue to occur today and this book did a great job of telling a story involving all of this. The way that the boys worked through their problems and realized that they weren't so different from each other made for a wonderful storyline and it kept me hooked the entire way through.

As a future teacher, I would most definitely use this book to teach about bullying and difficult issues young students may be going through. It would also be a great book to just have in a classroom library, so if a student was going through a situation like those in the book, this would be a wonderful tool to try to help them through it. This book could easily be used for any student in sixth grade and up.

[Jonathon · Rating 4 out of 5]

The tale of two bullies, from first met to last stand, the hatred always there. Games by Carol Gorman, is a book about two enemies, Mick Sullivan and Boot Quin. They harbor feelings of hate towards each other. The book takes place mainly at the middle school Mick and Boot attend, however the setting changes throughout the story, bringing the readers to places such as Mick or Boot’s home, recreational areas such as the library or the music shop, or even Mick’s vivid imagination.
Within the story, the characters are dealing with many conflicts in their lives at the moment. Mick, for instance, is struggling with his life with a dad who has a drinking problem and his mother on the verge of divorce, while Boot is struggling with the harmful, social, physical, and emotional effects from Mick’s bullying. A struggle both boys have in common is the struggle for a girl at school, Tabitha Slaters, attention. Tabitha usually is the drive for their fights in the story, because both boys want her to think of them, the hero.
The Author, Carol Gorman, did an amazing job with the story’s word choice, and she left leeway for your imagination to fill in the blanks of the story, instead of dealing you a cold hard description of the characters, and settings, that you may not like. This adds to the entertainment of the story because you can control how you visualize the setting, the characters, and the overall seriousness of the novel. For example, if you are feeling like a serious realistic novel one day, you can imagine and picture the story that way, or if you are feeling like a silly cartoonlike novel another day, you can picture it that way too. In conclusion Games is a fantastic novel because of its entertaining content that will make you sad to put the book down and because of its leeway for imagination.

[Karin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Mick Sullivan and Boot Quinn have been enemies since the day they first met. They have had countless fist fights and have already been suspended once in the first month of their eighth grade year.

Mick Sullivan is big for his age which make people think he likes to fight way more than he does. Actually, Mick likes to read more than anything else. He considers the library his second home. Mick's father is constantly trying to get him to be tougher and get him involved in sports, but Mick just doesn't enjoy them. Boot doesn't have many friends. He likes to play the guitar and wants to someday be in a band. His biggest goal for the day is to give Mick a hard time by teasing him about his father who has a drinking problem. Both boys have difficult home lives that they really keep hidden from everyone else. They also like Tabitha Slater, the most popular girl in the eighth grade.


Things start to change when a new principal comes to the school. After their latest fight, instead of suspending them again, he assigns the boys to come to the office to play games for an hour every day. This extra time together, without adult supervision, leads to some heated exchanges and ultimately some extremely devastating consequences for both Mick and Boot. While cooperation and civility don't happen in the traditional sense, they do start to learn about each other.


Carol Gorman, the author of the Dork in Disguise series, takes us on the emotional rollercoaster of middle school where what your friends think is what drives the majority of your decisions and with most people there is more than meets the eye.

[Salsabrarian · Rating 3 out of 5]

It took awhile for this story to take off for me, in part because I did not find the boys' personalities distinctive enough to remember whose voice was narrating a given chapter. Fans of books told in alternating perspectives (a la "Flipped") may enjoy this one.

Mick and Boot are sworn enemies for as long as they can remember. For
some reason they just can't stand each other. It's only September 8th
and they have had two fights at school already. Instead of suspending
them again,the new principal requires them to come in during class and
lunch and play board games. Relations continue to be prickly and the
animosity climaxes in a game of dare in front of their classmates. Mick's
dare is to splash red paint on the public library, his beloved hangout,
and Boot's dare is to shoplift an instrument from a music store run by
his closest friend. In alternating chapters (Mick's Turn, Boot's Turn)
we see their differing perspectives on the situation and how their
troubled home lives impact them. As the boys get to know each other, a sort of truce takes place

[Karen Ball · Rating 4 out of 5]

Mick Sullivan and Boot Quinn have been enemies for quite some time, and now they have a new principal who believes in solving problems differently. Thus, for two periods a day, they must come to the office, and sit in a room together and play board games until they can figure out how to get along. At first, it makes them angrier, and they challenge each other to a series of dares based on the things that are most important to each of them. They also both have a crush on Tabitha, who is secretly taking bets on how their daily games and dares will turn out. Both boys have issues at home: Mick is a constant disappointment to his dad since he doesn't like sports, and motherless Boot is often knocked around by his father and older brother. Told from both Mick's and Boot's point of view, the story is realistic and interesting, with great characters.

[Alison · Rating 5 out of 5]

"Boys will be boys" just about sums up this book. Boot Quinn and Mick Sullivan hate, no loathe each other. Their hatred for one another started over a class project back in elementary school. Now all the boys do is call each other names and beat each other up. The new principal, Mr. Maddox, decides to have the boys play board games to learn how to get along with each other. At first, it only makes things worse especially when the boys start competing for Tabithia Slater, the hottest girl in school. The boys decide to call a truce and play "Dare" instead. This turns out to be the worst idea ever because the boys dare each other to destroy what is their second homes. Boot and Mick also find out they both have bad dads. Does the result of the dares and their relationships with their dads help the boys find a common ground or add fuel to the fire?

[Vivien Sarabillo · Rating 5 out of 5]

Does putting "I like happy endings" count as a spoiler?

****

I like happy endings. Even though they seem a little to mainstream, it just feels so good to end one of your page turning adventures with a smile. Games by Carol Gorman is a page turner. 'Nuff said!

(But for the sake of adding a couple more sentences into this review..)

This book shows that...(1) Some people build a facade of power (2) You should look beyond that front (3) Because little do you know, they put up that veneer because of a very grave reason and lastly, (4- I call this the mother of all "lessons learned") Never ever EVER judge something or someone without getting to know it/them yet.

Call the stuff stated above Cliché all you want. I don't really care because they're a hundred percent genuinely true :P

[Brenda Thompson]

Mick Sullivan likes reading thrillers, daydreaming about Tabitha Slater, and teasing his archenemy, Boot Quinn. Boot Quinn likes playing his guitar, daydreaming about Tabitha Slater, and punching his adversary, Mick Sullivan. The two eighth graders are rivals in every way, and with two fights in the first week of school, they've set the stage for a yearlong showdown. That is, until a new principal arrives on the scene and forces Mick and Boot to spend an hour and a half each day playing games together. Two enemies, one small room, and no adult supervision 14battle lines are bound to be crossed. As the wins and losses are tallied, the boys find themselves fighting for their classmates' attention, a cute girl's affection, and their own fathers' respect. But how far are they willing to go to win? And who are they really fighting? There's only one way to find out. Game on.

[Deborah · Rating 2 out of 5]

After a history of fighting in and out of school, a new principal decides to place the two boys in a room by themselves hoping that they will play board games, learn something about each other, and kiss and make up. Oh, brother. But guess what!! It works. At the end of the book, Mick learns that Boot is being beaten by his father when he finds the Boot hiding in school one night. He goes for help, where??? To the abusing father who explains to Boot that his own father beat him when he was a boy, so he is sorry and won't ever do it again. So Boot goes home with his dad and Mick pats himself on the back. Riiiight. Not a good message for today's students.

[Ben M. · Rating 4 out of 5]

Games by Carol Gorman was a great book. I enjoyed reading it and once I started I could not put it down.I liked how the author took turns showing both Mick's and Boot's point of view about the many fights they have. Near the end the book took a surprising turn that led to the end of their fights. It was about two bullies who had been fighting for many years and about a principal who thinks that making them go down to the office to play games daily will fix their problems. Boot and Mick know they have many differences but what they don't know is that they are living very similar lives. I would recommend this book to anyone 12 and up because it's really not for young kids.

[Tina · Rating 4 out of 5]

2 bullies, 1 very cute girl and a whole school watching - leads to some very interesting meetings with the bullies. Mick - big, but very uncoordinated, prefers reading over sports. Boot - small for his age, wants to be in a rock band. After a fight at school, the new principal insists that they play board games through the noon hour with each other - unusual punishment with interesting results. Mick and Boot don't really know why they hate each other - they just do. Very good book - gives you a look inside what a bully might really be thinking.

[Dawn · Rating 4 out of 5]

Boot and Quinn are enemies that just seem to fight constantly. Finally their principal makes them meet in his office every day to play board games together in an effort to try to get them to at least find out something about each other. What I love about this story is that these boys learn to tolerate one another, but they will never really get along. It is realistic in that they don't suddenly become close friends. It is a good lesson for students to see that everyone has reasons for why they react to each other the way they do even if you don't agree with it.

[Lisa Nocita · Rating 3 out of 5]

The story of two guys who constantly find themselves in conflict with each other. The new principal decides to put them into a hour of assigned ISS each day together with the objective being that they play "games" to work on cooperation and getting to know each other. The story is told in turn by each boy. Of course, predictably, they initially hate the idea and are non-cooperative, but eventually they learn more about each other and gain insight and friendship.

[Janet · Rating 3 out of 5]

Two boys who can't stop provoking each other are forced by their new principal to play games with each other each day during an in-school suspension. The forced time together breaks down barriers between the boys and they become, if not friends, at least, no longer enemies.[return][return]Will have some appeal to boys and game players. Tension in the story is mild and could have been stronger to draw the reader in more toward the stories of the two boys and their very similar families.

[Jay · Rating 4 out of 5]

I really liked that my kids said "I'm really happy we're in a good family" while they were listening to this book. I also like the idea that people can't really be enemies once they are forced to get to know each other. There are a lot of lessons about peer pressure in this book, too. It's not really for younger kids, though.

[Ben · Rating 4 out of 5]

A cool book! About two bullies and they have been fighting against each other. The new principal has decided that they are going to play games until they can get along. The games include, Scrabble, Authors (A card Game), Connect Four, Checkers, ect. I thought that this book was for kids who like realistic fiction. I would recommend this book to everyone.

[B.A. Malisch · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a good story that gives you a different perspective on two bullies. These troubled boys have lots of issues and are basically enemies. They're forced to spend day after day together, playing games in a small space as punishment. . . or maybe rehab.

I really enjoyed the story. Unfortunately, the cover is awful, and that makes it harder to convince my students to read it.

[Cory · Rating 2 out of 5]

This was another one of those books that felt to me like it was set in the 40's or 50's, but that I think was set in the present. The insults the boys slung at each other just seemed so . . . tame and odd. And their interactions with the dream-girl were also weird.