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Jack Henry #1
Heads or Tails: Stories from the Sixth Grade
From the Newbery Medal–winning author of Dead End in Norvelt , eight more hysterical semi-autobiographical Jack Henry stories about a sixth grader's trials and tribulations
Jack's life is a crazy roller-coaster ride. At his fifth school in six years, he has a crackpot teacher who won't give him a break about his lousy handwriting and a secret crush who wants to be a policewoman. At home, he has a pesky little brother with a knack for getting hurt whenever Jack's supposed to be looking after him, a terror for an older sister, all sorts of weird neighbors, and, last but not least, ferocious alligators in the canal behind his house. Writing in his diary about his good days and bad days is one way Jack survives his up-and-down year. But he's also a kid who knows that life can go any which way at any given moment. He might as well flip a heads he wins, tails he loses. What will turn up next? A Common Core title.
Jack's life is a crazy roller-coaster ride. At his fifth school in six years, he has a crackpot teacher who won't give him a break about his lousy handwriting and a secret crush who wants to be a policewoman. At home, he has a pesky little brother with a knack for getting hurt whenever Jack's supposed to be looking after him, a terror for an older sister, all sorts of weird neighbors, and, last but not least, ferocious alligators in the canal behind his house. Writing in his diary about his good days and bad days is one way Jack survives his up-and-down year. But he's also a kid who knows that life can go any which way at any given moment. He might as well flip a heads he wins, tails he loses. What will turn up next? A Common Core title.
160 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1994
22 people are currently reading
222 people want to read
About the author
Jack Gantos
83 books551 followersJack Gantos is an American author of children's books renowned for his portrayal of fictional Joey Pigza, a boy with ADHD, and many other well known characters such as Rotten Ralph, Jack Henry, Jack Gantos (memoirs) and others. Gantos has won a number of awards, including the Newbery, the Newbery Honor, the Scott O'Dell Award, the Printz Honor, and the Sibert Honor from the American Library Association, and he has been a finalist for the National Book Award.
Gantos was born in Mount Pleasant, Pennsylvania to son of construction superintendent John Gantos and banker Elizabeth (Weaver) Gantos. The seeds for Jack Gantos' writing career were planted in sixth grade, when he read his sister's diary and decided he could write better than she could. Born in Mount Pleasant, Pennsylvania, and raised in Barbados and South Florida, Mr. Gantos began collecting anecdotes in grade school and later gathered them into stories.
After his senior year in high school (where he lived in a welfare motel) he moved to a Caribbean island (St Croix) and began to train as a builder. He soon realized that construction was not his forté and started saving for college. While in St. Croix he met a drug smuggler and was offered a chance to make 10 000 dollars by sailing to New York with 2,000 pounds of hash. With an English eccentric captain on board they set off to the big city. Once there they hung out at the Chelsea hotel and Gantos carried on dreaming about college. Then, in Jacks own words, "The **** hit the fan" and the F.B.I. burst in on him. He managed to escape and hid out in the very same welfare motel he was living during high school. However, he saw sense and turned himself in. He was sentenced to six years in prison, which he describes in his novel -HOLE IN MY LIFE-. However, after a year and a half in prison he applied to college, was accepted. He was released from prison, entered college, and soon began his writing career.
He received his BFA and his MA both from Emerson College. While in college, Jack began working on picture books with an illustrator friend. In 1976, they published their first book, Rotten Ralph. Mr. Gantos continued writing children's books and began teaching courses in children's book writing. He developed the master's degree program in children's book writing at Emerson College in Boston. In 1995 he resigned his tenured position in order to further his writing career (which turned out to be a great decision).
He married art dealer Anne A. Lower on November 11, 1989. The couple has one child, Mabel, and they live in Boston, Massachusetts.
www.jackgantos.com
Gantos was born in Mount Pleasant, Pennsylvania to son of construction superintendent John Gantos and banker Elizabeth (Weaver) Gantos. The seeds for Jack Gantos' writing career were planted in sixth grade, when he read his sister's diary and decided he could write better than she could. Born in Mount Pleasant, Pennsylvania, and raised in Barbados and South Florida, Mr. Gantos began collecting anecdotes in grade school and later gathered them into stories.
After his senior year in high school (where he lived in a welfare motel) he moved to a Caribbean island (St Croix) and began to train as a builder. He soon realized that construction was not his forté and started saving for college. While in St. Croix he met a drug smuggler and was offered a chance to make 10 000 dollars by sailing to New York with 2,000 pounds of hash. With an English eccentric captain on board they set off to the big city. Once there they hung out at the Chelsea hotel and Gantos carried on dreaming about college. Then, in Jacks own words, "The **** hit the fan" and the F.B.I. burst in on him. He managed to escape and hid out in the very same welfare motel he was living during high school. However, he saw sense and turned himself in. He was sentenced to six years in prison, which he describes in his novel -HOLE IN MY LIFE-. However, after a year and a half in prison he applied to college, was accepted. He was released from prison, entered college, and soon began his writing career.
He received his BFA and his MA both from Emerson College. While in college, Jack began working on picture books with an illustrator friend. In 1976, they published their first book, Rotten Ralph. Mr. Gantos continued writing children's books and began teaching courses in children's book writing. He developed the master's degree program in children's book writing at Emerson College in Boston. In 1995 he resigned his tenured position in order to further his writing career (which turned out to be a great decision).
He married art dealer Anne A. Lower on November 11, 1989. The couple has one child, Mabel, and they live in Boston, Massachusetts.
www.jackgantos.com
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 41 reviews
November 8, 2013
I admit that I am a Jack Gantos fan, and so is my nearly 8 year old grandson. He owns this book, and it is a signed copy! I selected it a couple of weeks ago as our read aloud over breakfast, thinking we could easily do a chapter a day, but it took a bit longer than I had expected. There is the expected humor, and the problems that occur for the main character, Jack.
Jack has been in five schools in six years, and his family rents a house in Fort Lauderdale, next to the Pagoda family (who are a bit like the Pigza family from other Gantos books--a good bit on the looney side of normal). The lad and I got a kick out of some of the situations, but there were also parts of some stories which troubled him. In the first story, the death of a pilot in a plane crash was not very disturbing because the focus was really elsewhere. When Jack's grandfather died and they had to travel to Pennsylvania for the funeral, my reading partner and I had to stop and do a bit of personal talk. He was a bit troubled about the thought of me dying. Hey, it is going to happen, eventually. Death becomes a theme which really hit home to him when the family dog dies, in a most horrible way in one of the last stories. It was this final death that really troubled the boy, because he has lost pets and knows how it feels to have animals that he has loved and tended suddenly stop living.
I am glad that we read this together, because it gave him opportunity to talk about death, which he would not have had so readily if he had read it on his own.
There is plenty more to this thin volume than death. The stories are filled with just the kinds of childhood adventure and silliness that Jack Gantos does so well, and it helps to balance the hard realities of loss and disappointment that are a part of life, as much as Death and Taxes (the title of one chapter).
Jack has been in five schools in six years, and his family rents a house in Fort Lauderdale, next to the Pagoda family (who are a bit like the Pigza family from other Gantos books--a good bit on the looney side of normal). The lad and I got a kick out of some of the situations, but there were also parts of some stories which troubled him. In the first story, the death of a pilot in a plane crash was not very disturbing because the focus was really elsewhere. When Jack's grandfather died and they had to travel to Pennsylvania for the funeral, my reading partner and I had to stop and do a bit of personal talk. He was a bit troubled about the thought of me dying. Hey, it is going to happen, eventually. Death becomes a theme which really hit home to him when the family dog dies, in a most horrible way in one of the last stories. It was this final death that really troubled the boy, because he has lost pets and knows how it feels to have animals that he has loved and tended suddenly stop living.
I am glad that we read this together, because it gave him opportunity to talk about death, which he would not have had so readily if he had read it on his own.
There is plenty more to this thin volume than death. The stories are filled with just the kinds of childhood adventure and silliness that Jack Gantos does so well, and it helps to balance the hard realities of loss and disappointment that are a part of life, as much as Death and Taxes (the title of one chapter).
June 12, 2012
Sometimes it seems as if Jack Gantos has an unending well of story ideas from his days as a kid. He takes actual experiences from the first twelve years or so of his life and mixes in just enough fiction to make for stories that are hilarious to readers of any age and reading level. Dead End in Norvelt, winner of the 2012 John Newbery Medal, may be his most famous example of this, but Jack Gantos had started with that form of storytelling long before his Newbery Medal winner was ever published. In 1994, Heads or Tails: Stories from the Sixth Grade launched the popular new character of Jack Henry, through whom Jack Gantos could live his memorable childhood days again (albeit in somewhat invented fashion) and give his readers a taste of what it was like to be a kid decades earlier. Life in the 1970s (which was actually about ten years after Jack Gantos, himself, was in sixth grade) wasn't a whole lot different from life in the '90s, as it turned out, and Jack Henry proved to be nearly as popular and enduring a character as Gantos's classic picture-book cat, Rotten Ralph.
Heads or Tails is about Jack, his older sister Betsy, five-year-old brother Pete, and mother and father living in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, scrimping and saving and trying to stay afloat with never a break in the financial crises that keep on coming their way. Jack doesn't demand much; for the most part, all he really wants is to have peace with his parents and for his friends to like him, to keep Pete and himself out of major trouble and have some fun along the way. He knows that his parents can't afford to buy him all of the things he wants, but he's learned to adapt to that reality, as do most kids who come from households of modest means. Jack's father has difficulty holding down a job for very long, and so his family has moved five times in the past six years, heading to wherever it is next that promises solid employment, even though it never seems to work out over the long haul. Despite the transitory nature of his life, however, Jack is able to come up with a few new friends wherever he goes, and we see some of his Ft. Lauderdale friends in the adventures of this book. From the outside, Jack may appear not to be especially good at dealing with change, but he always lands on his feet, coping with whatever new storms enter his life and being willing to rebuild on the other side of them. For Jack, contentment hinges on his ability to get back up after being knocked down and adapt to changes as they arrive.
Besides Jack, I think that my favorite character in Heads or Tails has to be his younger brother, Pete, who appears as a main character in a few of the stories. Pete is smart, and knows how to use what minor leverage he has to get what he wants, but he's also sensitive to what's happening to the people around him, quick to break into tears if he thinks that some calamity has befallen Jack or any of the rest of the family. Pete often follows Jack's lead, which lands him in some bad situations in Heads or Tails, and it's this reality that eventually causes Jack to reevaluate the choices that he makes in his own life. If the bad decisions that he makes aren't only going to affect himself, but Pete also, usually with more severe consequences for Pete since he isn't as savvy or aware as Jack, then maybe there's something to what his father says about Jack being responsible for Pete's safety. Maybe he really should think about the messages that he's sending his younger brother through every action he takes, wordlessly declaring some things to be all right and others off-limits. It's important business, being a role model, and what he leads Pete into today could have a big impact on his tomorrow, as well as the many tomorrows that follow.
Heads or Tails is sort of a hybrid book, not completely definable as either a collection of short stories or a traditional junior novel. Therefore, it's kind of hard to say which individual stories are the best, since they all run together and refer back to previous happenings on a consistent basis. Still, if I were to highlight just a few of the eight stories in this book as being particularly noteworthy, I'd have to say that My Brother's Finger, Death and Taxes and Cocoa Beach are the three best. If I were to choose a fourth, it might be My Brother's Arm. These chapters strike me as being the most thoughtfully and sensitively written, and I don't think it's a coincidence that two of the four feature Jack's brother, Pete, as a main character. One can see the beginning stages of a future Newbery Medalist developing his novel-writing style in this book, figuring out how to tell stories that are fresh but also have some deeper meaning, humorous while still containing real literary value. I think that Heads or Tails accomplishes this balance well, and makes me eager to delve into the rest of the series and find out what happens with Jack next.
Jack Gantos's books are always very readable, entertaining for all ages and good for generating further conversation between kids about what the stories mean to them. I've become quite a fan of Jack Gantos, and would enthusiastically recommend any of his books that I've ever read. My rating of Heads or Tails is definitely two and a half stars, and I thought for a while about rounding it up to three. I'm confident that most any reader will find something to like about this book.
Heads or Tails is about Jack, his older sister Betsy, five-year-old brother Pete, and mother and father living in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, scrimping and saving and trying to stay afloat with never a break in the financial crises that keep on coming their way. Jack doesn't demand much; for the most part, all he really wants is to have peace with his parents and for his friends to like him, to keep Pete and himself out of major trouble and have some fun along the way. He knows that his parents can't afford to buy him all of the things he wants, but he's learned to adapt to that reality, as do most kids who come from households of modest means. Jack's father has difficulty holding down a job for very long, and so his family has moved five times in the past six years, heading to wherever it is next that promises solid employment, even though it never seems to work out over the long haul. Despite the transitory nature of his life, however, Jack is able to come up with a few new friends wherever he goes, and we see some of his Ft. Lauderdale friends in the adventures of this book. From the outside, Jack may appear not to be especially good at dealing with change, but he always lands on his feet, coping with whatever new storms enter his life and being willing to rebuild on the other side of them. For Jack, contentment hinges on his ability to get back up after being knocked down and adapt to changes as they arrive.
Besides Jack, I think that my favorite character in Heads or Tails has to be his younger brother, Pete, who appears as a main character in a few of the stories. Pete is smart, and knows how to use what minor leverage he has to get what he wants, but he's also sensitive to what's happening to the people around him, quick to break into tears if he thinks that some calamity has befallen Jack or any of the rest of the family. Pete often follows Jack's lead, which lands him in some bad situations in Heads or Tails, and it's this reality that eventually causes Jack to reevaluate the choices that he makes in his own life. If the bad decisions that he makes aren't only going to affect himself, but Pete also, usually with more severe consequences for Pete since he isn't as savvy or aware as Jack, then maybe there's something to what his father says about Jack being responsible for Pete's safety. Maybe he really should think about the messages that he's sending his younger brother through every action he takes, wordlessly declaring some things to be all right and others off-limits. It's important business, being a role model, and what he leads Pete into today could have a big impact on his tomorrow, as well as the many tomorrows that follow.
Heads or Tails is sort of a hybrid book, not completely definable as either a collection of short stories or a traditional junior novel. Therefore, it's kind of hard to say which individual stories are the best, since they all run together and refer back to previous happenings on a consistent basis. Still, if I were to highlight just a few of the eight stories in this book as being particularly noteworthy, I'd have to say that My Brother's Finger, Death and Taxes and Cocoa Beach are the three best. If I were to choose a fourth, it might be My Brother's Arm. These chapters strike me as being the most thoughtfully and sensitively written, and I don't think it's a coincidence that two of the four feature Jack's brother, Pete, as a main character. One can see the beginning stages of a future Newbery Medalist developing his novel-writing style in this book, figuring out how to tell stories that are fresh but also have some deeper meaning, humorous while still containing real literary value. I think that Heads or Tails accomplishes this balance well, and makes me eager to delve into the rest of the series and find out what happens with Jack next.
Jack Gantos's books are always very readable, entertaining for all ages and good for generating further conversation between kids about what the stories mean to them. I've become quite a fan of Jack Gantos, and would enthusiastically recommend any of his books that I've ever read. My rating of Heads or Tails is definitely two and a half stars, and I thought for a while about rounding it up to three. I'm confident that most any reader will find something to like about this book.
September 27, 2014
I got these over the summer since my son was moving from 5th to 6th grade. I thought he would read them on his own, but he never did, so we picked up Jack on the Tracks: Four Seasons of Fifth Grade for bedtime reading after finishing The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn and then followed it with this one. As in Jack on the Tracks: Four Seasons of Fifth Grade. There is a lot of humor in the book, some gross-out moments (perfect for many boys of this age), and some deeper wisdom thrown in there. Not sure how much of the wisdom will stick in my son's head, but we enjoyed it. One thing that confused him at first, though, is that the family has moved so the setting was different, and Jack is forced to make new friends. The move wasn't entirely clear from the first chapter (maybe it's only mentioned in the summary blurb on the back?), but once we got that straightened out, it was full speed ahead.
September 20, 2014
The stories in this collection are darker than the wacky cover would lead you to believe. Yes, these are funny stories about growing up, but many of them are tinged with the sad realization that life isn't exactly what you hoped it would be.
June 16, 2017
One of the short stories from this novel is used as a mentor text in the personal narrative writing unit I teach so I thought I'd read the entire book of short stories. To my disappointment, the one I use in class was not in this book - maybe in a newer/revised edition - I don't know. However, I LOVE this book! It is full of mentor texts to use in the classroom, and it's interesting to 6th graders! Win-win! I love the fact that Gantos isn't afraid to tackle the tough stuff in life and to be vulnerable. 6th graders need to see that and be able to model it. Plus, his writing is just fun to read!
September 17, 2017
This is Jacks fifth school is six years. He struggles with his crazy teacher, a pest of a little brother, an older sister who mocks him, and the sound of music blaring overnight from a nearby-drive in. Jack still writes in his diary about his good days and bad days. This is one of the ways Jack survives his up-and-down year. But he's also a kid who knows that life can go any which way at any given moment.
September 20, 2018
Jack has a diary that helps him deal with his problems which include dog-eating alligators, a terror for an older sister, a younger brother who keeps breaking parts of himself, and next-door neighbors who are weird. I found it as an okay book with its ups and downs.
February 6, 2019
I read this book aloud to our 6th grade son the year after we "met" Jack at a children's lit fest and loved his stories and his personality and fancy for all writing pens and accessories and such. Our son tasted this 5 out of 5 stars because there was nothing at all that could make it any better.
August 16, 2017
So ends the summer of Gantos for me? This collection of stories was solid, like the first Norvelt book.
September 8, 2017
Really fantastic collection of short stories. I have been finding them really useful in teaching various aspects of writing a narrative.
September 13, 2017
I think it was a great book there were some sad parts because of his grandfather dieing and by being regected but I sill loved the book I think every 6th greader should read this book
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
June 30, 2021
Only Jack Gantos could pull off a book like this!
January 31, 2014
Horn Book starred (September, 1994)
Eight stories bearing close resemblance to events from the author's childhood in the 1960s feature typical family scenarios. Told in the first person, the stories are whimsical, low key, and appealing, largely because of their real-life quality. Despite a setting that is "historical" to today's readers, the feelings transcend the years.
Kirkus Reviews (1994)
Though Jack has lived in nine houses and gone to five schools in his young life, three things have remained constant: a stable family, his father's inability to find a permanent job -- and The Sound of Music, playing at the local drive-in since he moved to his Fort Lauderdale neighborhood. Gantos (Rotten Ralph) depicts him in a loosely knit series of incidents -- tragic, comic, or both. When Jack copies his older sister's handwriting and his teacher accuses him of cheating, he vengefully shows her his diary, which also contains his pressed bug collection; he forgets to put his bike away and loses it in a hurricane; when his little brother points a finger-gun at a passing plane and it crashes, Jack takes quick action to save him from a lifetime of guilt; at his grandfather's sad funeral, he talks with a man who claims to have touched a UFO. Surrounded by a quirky cast (a relentlessly pessimistic older sister, a mother who makes the best of things, neighbors who remind Jack of the Stupids), Jack is an innocent with a sixth-grader's sensibility and a good heart, learning how quickly life's highs can become lows and vice versa. In the end, another job falls through and the family prepares to move; still, The Sound of Music finally gives way to Planet of the Apes. Funny moments, with an underlying poignancy.
Publishers Weekly (June 6, 1994)
The author of the offbeat Rotten Ralph picture books makes an auspicious foray into new ground with this semi-autobiographical, wholly engaging novel. His narrator, Jack, travels through the often poignant moments that highlight his sixth grade year, at the same time describing his unpredictable family life: ``Since I was born, we had already lived in nine different houses. I hated that word `renter.' It made me feel that I didn't really belong anywhere, like we had to pay people to put up with us,'' he says. Stuck between an older sister he emulates and a pesky if appealing younger brother, Jack always strives to do the right thing--often to land in trouble. His perspective is quirky but reliable, and often surprising. The first chapter, for example, describes Jack's three-year battle to fill his diary; when he can think of nothing to write, he begins to pack the diary with ``stuff''--bugs, baseball cards, stamps and so on--but he concludes, ``I was covering over the empty white space of the pages in the same way I covered my eyes with my hands when I watched a monster movie.'' A bittersweet resonance filters the humor in these stories, and lingers most welcomely. Ages 10-up. (June)
School Library Journal (June 1994)
Gr 5-8-A book that reads like an improbably successful collaboration between Betsy Byars and William Sleator: funny but ...weird! Set in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, sometime in the late '60s, these eight stories about an appealing sixth grader named Jack are filled with oddball characters and offbeat situations: neighbors, for example, keep 30 dogs (in the house), paint an atom bomb target on the roof, and drive cars on their lawn. Jack's world is not only weird, it's rootless. He's lived in nine different houses and attended five schools in six years-and, some days, it's even dangerously out of control: a plane falls out of the sky and the pilot is killed; the family's dog is eaten by an alligator; younger brother Pete keeps getting injured while in his care-no wonder Jack always thinks the worst and wistfully believes in UFOs, hoping ``they'll take me away from all this confusion and set me down in a place without fear.'' And yet Jack, like the watch that takes a licking, always keeps on ticking, performing acts of unselfconscious kindness. He's a survivor, an ``everyboy'' whose world may be wacko but whose heart and spirit are eminently sane and generous. Gantos is a terrific writer with a wonderfully wry sensibility, a real talent for turning artful phrases, and a gift for creating memorable characters. In the first story Jack thinks, ``I can either be a copycat for the rest of my life or I can be one-of-a-kind.'' By the final story, readers will realize that he has become the latter and so has this memorable book about him.-Michael Cart, formerly at Beverly Hills Public Library
Eight stories bearing close resemblance to events from the author's childhood in the 1960s feature typical family scenarios. Told in the first person, the stories are whimsical, low key, and appealing, largely because of their real-life quality. Despite a setting that is "historical" to today's readers, the feelings transcend the years.
Kirkus Reviews (1994)
Though Jack has lived in nine houses and gone to five schools in his young life, three things have remained constant: a stable family, his father's inability to find a permanent job -- and The Sound of Music, playing at the local drive-in since he moved to his Fort Lauderdale neighborhood. Gantos (Rotten Ralph) depicts him in a loosely knit series of incidents -- tragic, comic, or both. When Jack copies his older sister's handwriting and his teacher accuses him of cheating, he vengefully shows her his diary, which also contains his pressed bug collection; he forgets to put his bike away and loses it in a hurricane; when his little brother points a finger-gun at a passing plane and it crashes, Jack takes quick action to save him from a lifetime of guilt; at his grandfather's sad funeral, he talks with a man who claims to have touched a UFO. Surrounded by a quirky cast (a relentlessly pessimistic older sister, a mother who makes the best of things, neighbors who remind Jack of the Stupids), Jack is an innocent with a sixth-grader's sensibility and a good heart, learning how quickly life's highs can become lows and vice versa. In the end, another job falls through and the family prepares to move; still, The Sound of Music finally gives way to Planet of the Apes. Funny moments, with an underlying poignancy.
Publishers Weekly (June 6, 1994)
The author of the offbeat Rotten Ralph picture books makes an auspicious foray into new ground with this semi-autobiographical, wholly engaging novel. His narrator, Jack, travels through the often poignant moments that highlight his sixth grade year, at the same time describing his unpredictable family life: ``Since I was born, we had already lived in nine different houses. I hated that word `renter.' It made me feel that I didn't really belong anywhere, like we had to pay people to put up with us,'' he says. Stuck between an older sister he emulates and a pesky if appealing younger brother, Jack always strives to do the right thing--often to land in trouble. His perspective is quirky but reliable, and often surprising. The first chapter, for example, describes Jack's three-year battle to fill his diary; when he can think of nothing to write, he begins to pack the diary with ``stuff''--bugs, baseball cards, stamps and so on--but he concludes, ``I was covering over the empty white space of the pages in the same way I covered my eyes with my hands when I watched a monster movie.'' A bittersweet resonance filters the humor in these stories, and lingers most welcomely. Ages 10-up. (June)
School Library Journal (June 1994)
Gr 5-8-A book that reads like an improbably successful collaboration between Betsy Byars and William Sleator: funny but ...weird! Set in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, sometime in the late '60s, these eight stories about an appealing sixth grader named Jack are filled with oddball characters and offbeat situations: neighbors, for example, keep 30 dogs (in the house), paint an atom bomb target on the roof, and drive cars on their lawn. Jack's world is not only weird, it's rootless. He's lived in nine different houses and attended five schools in six years-and, some days, it's even dangerously out of control: a plane falls out of the sky and the pilot is killed; the family's dog is eaten by an alligator; younger brother Pete keeps getting injured while in his care-no wonder Jack always thinks the worst and wistfully believes in UFOs, hoping ``they'll take me away from all this confusion and set me down in a place without fear.'' And yet Jack, like the watch that takes a licking, always keeps on ticking, performing acts of unselfconscious kindness. He's a survivor, an ``everyboy'' whose world may be wacko but whose heart and spirit are eminently sane and generous. Gantos is a terrific writer with a wonderfully wry sensibility, a real talent for turning artful phrases, and a gift for creating memorable characters. In the first story Jack thinks, ``I can either be a copycat for the rest of my life or I can be one-of-a-kind.'' By the final story, readers will realize that he has become the latter and so has this memorable book about him.-Michael Cart, formerly at Beverly Hills Public Library
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
March 9, 2017
I thoroughly enjoyed these stories. I had the privilege of hearing Jack Gantos talk at an educator conference last week and he was so interesting and entertaining! I'm working my way through his books.
November 8, 2023
I'd give it four stars, but I had to take one off because of the downer/bittersweet ending after the writer gave so much hope of a good future for the Henrys after so much despair.
January 12, 2012
Heads or Tails by Jack Gantos is a collection of stories told from the viewpoint of Jack Henry, a sixth grader living in Fort Lauderdale, FL. Gantos took ideas from his own childhood journal to create Jack Henry’s world. Jack’s family is not well-off; in fact, they’ve moved nine times in his short life, renting every home he’s stayed in. His father has changed jobs more times than that. Jack has an older sister in 8th grade, Betsy, and a younger brother, Pete, in first. Betsy wants nothing to do with Jack, while Pete can’t stay away. There are eight stories total, and each deal with humor, death, family, and of course, childhood. Reader beware: my least favorite thing to read is animal death or cruelty, and it happens to occur in this book.
Favorite quotes:
“But reading junk books is the same as having to eat someone else’s leftovers.” p.50
…
“I imagined going up to heaven and meeting Jesus, who was a big black man with a chorus of angels. I would list all my sins and Jesus would forgive me and then we’d all sing, “Jesus dropped the charges!” We’d dance around the clouds, clap our hands, and sing like there was no tomorrow.” p.90
…
“I was hoping for piano lessons. We hadn’t been able to afford it, which upset me because I had a suspicion that I could be a great piano player if only I had the chance.” p.137
Favorite quotes:
“But reading junk books is the same as having to eat someone else’s leftovers.” p.50
…
“I imagined going up to heaven and meeting Jesus, who was a big black man with a chorus of angels. I would list all my sins and Jesus would forgive me and then we’d all sing, “Jesus dropped the charges!” We’d dance around the clouds, clap our hands, and sing like there was no tomorrow.” p.90
…
“I was hoping for piano lessons. We hadn’t been able to afford it, which upset me because I had a suspicion that I could be a great piano player if only I had the chance.” p.137
August 31, 2014
Jack lives a heads or tails life when one flip of the coin can change his life for good or bad. While the coin consistently flips on the loosing side, he finds adventure and drama at each turn.
With a father who cannot seem to find the right job, nor can he keep it, living in six rental homes in five years keeps him hoping and navigating different rules and different schools.
A sister who is bratty and cruel, a little brother who is insistent of wanting Jack's attention, and a mother who does the best she can through it all, Jack never misses opportunity to get in trouble.
Written from Jack's perspective, the style if funny and engaging. I laughed out loud at some of these exploits.
While poverty isn't funny, the stories told made me want to walk along with Jack and see the world through his humorous eyes.
With a father who cannot seem to find the right job, nor can he keep it, living in six rental homes in five years keeps him hoping and navigating different rules and different schools.
A sister who is bratty and cruel, a little brother who is insistent of wanting Jack's attention, and a mother who does the best she can through it all, Jack never misses opportunity to get in trouble.
Written from Jack's perspective, the style if funny and engaging. I laughed out loud at some of these exploits.
While poverty isn't funny, the stories told made me want to walk along with Jack and see the world through his humorous eyes.
February 10, 2008
I wanted to love it. (I find myself saying that often.) Sixth grade is an up-and-down year, and we can always use more funny and honest stories about it. This was definitely both those things. But although I think episodic structure can work, it didn't really this time, possibly because many of the chapters introduced new characters and didn't give me time to care about them. The MC has the same first name as the author, which makes me think this is largely autobiographical; including autobiographical events is a fine thing to do, but in fiction, telling a good story needs to trump whatever really happened.
March 31, 2012
I enjoyed the book, and especially related to his story of riding his bike behind the mosquito fogger. How many other people my age must have done that as a kid? Dave did too, and now I'm wondering if everyone did. Where were our parents?? How could they not know that was unhealthy?
It was a great book for showing how kids deal with things that happen and how they view family life ex. having to watch out for the younger brother.
I recently saw Jack Gantos speak at the reading conference, so I tried to imagine his voice reading it. He was a great speaker to see - very animated and fun.
It was a great book for showing how kids deal with things that happen and how they view family life ex. having to watch out for the younger brother.
I recently saw Jack Gantos speak at the reading conference, so I tried to imagine his voice reading it. He was a great speaker to see - very animated and fun.
July 27, 2011
This book is part of a series of semi-autobiographical stories from author Jack Gantos. You know, most people need to embellish stories from their lives to make them more interesting; you get the feeling that Gantos needs to tone his stories down because he manages to get into so much trouble! I really loved these stories of a kid with an imperfect but loving family; you'll root for him the whole time.
April 26, 2015
Very amusing for tweeners. Not so much for old farts like me. I enjoyed it like I would a Reader's Digest article--cute, but shallow. It's not exactly something I'll seek out and read more of. It wasn't as clever as Danny Dunn nor as historically amusing as The Great Brain. And definitely not as flat-out-funny as Pat McManus's childhood tales. But it was amusing.
Definitely recommended for pre-teen boys.
Definitely recommended for pre-teen boys.
May 1, 2016
i liked this book, but it was kind of dark. But I believe that's how life is. Nothing goes as planned and nothing goes how you want it to go. Jack grows up with a hard life with a father is is basically unstable and has to constantly move. Jack doesn't have any consistency in his life. Although, this book was dark, it was very funny. It really made me think and had some thoughtful parts in it. I'm definitely recommending this to my 10 year old nephew!
May 2, 2013
Lots of humor and realistic scenarios from Jack Gantos, the king of misadventures. This book contains several short stories about Jack's experiences during his sixth grade year. Some are laugh-out-loud funny, others seem odd additions. The ending is abrupt-- no warning, just over. I was hoping there would be a more sophisticated ending that would link all the stories together cohesively.
March 7, 2014
This boom by jack Fantis is amazing! This book was written on 1994, but seems like it's been write in 2013. I enjoyed his book very much. Te book is about the kids story's my favorite was when they went to cocoa beach and are about to mor there,but using want to spoil it. There are about 7 or 6 stories in he book. I enjoyed and you might too.
October 7, 2016
I think the book Heads or Tails by Jack Gantos was a great book! The book was about his short stories from the 6th grade.My favorite short story from his book was copycat because i like the way the story
ends because the mean teacher that believed that jack wrote his own work felt stupid at the end. I really recommend this book to people that want to have a good laugh or smile.
ends because the mean teacher that believed that jack wrote his own work felt stupid at the end. I really recommend this book to people that want to have a good laugh or smile.
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January 10, 2017The book heads or tails was a very short book. It was easy to read but didn't make much sense. The chapters where all a different book it felt like. If you want a quick and easy read i would recamend this book but if you want a book that makes sense to you and where you can follow the plot line i wouldn't recomend it.
October 6, 2009
It was an amzaming book. You never knew what was going to happen next in the book. There was alot of times when I wanted to cry but also times when I wanted to laugh to I cried. It is a good book.It is based on the author life. It teaches you what not to do if you don't want to get in troble.
January 25, 2016
I love the mischief the character gets into, so different from my life. If you liked the autobiographical nature of Fig Pudding by Ralph Fletcher you'll like this book, it's just a bit more "raw". He's got more in the series of Jack I'd like to read.
October 15, 2008
idk what to say
March 19, 2009
I didn't like this book because it has no story-line. what you think is the story line ends up being the end of the book.
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