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Where The Kissing Never Stops
Walker's dad is dead, his girlfriend has moved away, and he's gained weight. In other words, this is not the time for him to find out his mother has taken a job as a stripper at a nightclub. Then he meets Rachel, whose father wants to build a new mall in the area. Coincidentally, Walker's father left him a piece of land on which the mall is to be built. After farming the land, Walker decides not to sell and gets up the courage to tell Rachel about his mother. She's known all along and doesn't care. It adds up to a lot of male adolescent angst wrapped not-too-discreetly around a thin plot. Walker has some capacity for humor regarding his plights, but it doesn't sustain this one.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.
Copyright 1986 Reed Business Information, Inc.
224 pages, Hardcover
First published January 1, 1986
2 people are currently reading
161 people want to read
About the author
Ron Koertge
75 books102 followersAsk Ron Koertge what he brings to the realm of young adult fiction, and the seasoned author responds matter-of-factly. "I write dialogue well, and I'm funny," he says--an assessment few would argue with. "I like iconoclasm and practice it in my fiction. I don't like pretense or hypocrisy. I'm almost always irreverent."
A faculty member for more than 35 years at Pasadena City College, where he has taught everything from Shakespeare to remedial writing, Ron Koertge is the author of several acclaimed novels, most of them for young adults. That Ron Koertge is a master at capturing teenagers' voices--often in witty repartee--is fully evident in MARGAUX WITH AN X, the story of a sharp-tongued beauty and a quirky, quick-witted loner. "MARGAUX WITH AN X started as a short story, but the heroine wouldn't let me alone," the author says. "She had a story to tell, and she wanted a whole novel to tell it in." Another unlikely pairing is found in STONER & SPAZ, Ron Koertge's funny, in-your-face tale of a young cinephile with cerebral palsy and the stoner who steals his heart. "My wife works with the disabled," the writer says of his inspiration for the novel, which quickly garnered critical acclaim. "One night she came home and told me about a young man she'd been working with. He had C.P. and a terrific sense of humor. Coincidentally, that day I had talked to a former student of mine who'd recently been in rehab for substance abuse. What would happen, I wondered, if those two knew each other?"
In addition to his young adult novels, Ron Koertge writes poetry, and has been dubbed "the wisest, most entertaining wiseguy in American poetry" by poet-laureate Billy Collins. SHAKESPEARE BATS CLEANUP is narrated by a straight-talking, fourteen-year-old first baseman who has been benched by mono and decides to take a swing at writing poetry. Written entirely in free verse, with examples of several poetic forms slipped into the mix--including a sonnet, haiku, pastoral, and even a pantoum--SHAKESPEARE BATS CLEANUP is a veritable English teacher's dream. "The interest in SHAKESPEARE BATS CLEANUP is less with the arc of the plot than with the individual poems, some of which demonstrate poetic form, some of which tell the story," the author says. "One of my biggest challenges was to write like a fourteen-year-old who has a knack for writing poetry, and not just sound like a sixty-one-year-old pretending to be one!"
The author's first book with Candlewick, THE BRIMSTONE JOURNALS, is also a novel written in free verse, with 15 different teenage characters narrating four or five poems each. "The book started to nag me a few months before the shooting at Columbine High School in Colorado, and I started to make notes in the form of poems," he says of the hauntingly prescient work. "BRIMSTONE needed to move at high velocity, and this form is perfect for that: no tail fins, no leather seats, no moon roof. Just get in and go."
Ron Koertge grew up in an agricultural area in an old mining town in Illinois, just across the Mississippi from St. Louis, Missouri. There he learned to "drive a tractor and buck hay bales, which are clearly useful skills in Los Angeles," he quips. He and his wife live in South Pasadena, California.
A faculty member for more than 35 years at Pasadena City College, where he has taught everything from Shakespeare to remedial writing, Ron Koertge is the author of several acclaimed novels, most of them for young adults. That Ron Koertge is a master at capturing teenagers' voices--often in witty repartee--is fully evident in MARGAUX WITH AN X, the story of a sharp-tongued beauty and a quirky, quick-witted loner. "MARGAUX WITH AN X started as a short story, but the heroine wouldn't let me alone," the author says. "She had a story to tell, and she wanted a whole novel to tell it in." Another unlikely pairing is found in STONER & SPAZ, Ron Koertge's funny, in-your-face tale of a young cinephile with cerebral palsy and the stoner who steals his heart. "My wife works with the disabled," the writer says of his inspiration for the novel, which quickly garnered critical acclaim. "One night she came home and told me about a young man she'd been working with. He had C.P. and a terrific sense of humor. Coincidentally, that day I had talked to a former student of mine who'd recently been in rehab for substance abuse. What would happen, I wondered, if those two knew each other?"
In addition to his young adult novels, Ron Koertge writes poetry, and has been dubbed "the wisest, most entertaining wiseguy in American poetry" by poet-laureate Billy Collins. SHAKESPEARE BATS CLEANUP is narrated by a straight-talking, fourteen-year-old first baseman who has been benched by mono and decides to take a swing at writing poetry. Written entirely in free verse, with examples of several poetic forms slipped into the mix--including a sonnet, haiku, pastoral, and even a pantoum--SHAKESPEARE BATS CLEANUP is a veritable English teacher's dream. "The interest in SHAKESPEARE BATS CLEANUP is less with the arc of the plot than with the individual poems, some of which demonstrate poetic form, some of which tell the story," the author says. "One of my biggest challenges was to write like a fourteen-year-old who has a knack for writing poetry, and not just sound like a sixty-one-year-old pretending to be one!"
The author's first book with Candlewick, THE BRIMSTONE JOURNALS, is also a novel written in free verse, with 15 different teenage characters narrating four or five poems each. "The book started to nag me a few months before the shooting at Columbine High School in Colorado, and I started to make notes in the form of poems," he says of the hauntingly prescient work. "BRIMSTONE needed to move at high velocity, and this form is perfect for that: no tail fins, no leather seats, no moon roof. Just get in and go."
Ron Koertge grew up in an agricultural area in an old mining town in Illinois, just across the Mississippi from St. Louis, Missouri. There he learned to "drive a tractor and buck hay bales, which are clearly useful skills in Los Angeles," he quips. He and his wife live in South Pasadena, California.
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Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews
November 15, 2019
This is the story of a young man whose widowed mother decides to become an ecdysiast. Koertg presses the charmingly naïve humor so common to real-life adolescence against that age-old question: how do I get a girlfriend when my mother is a stripper?
Funny, sad, and strangely philosophical in that quirky way teenagers have of looking at the world, I quite enjoyed this one.
Funny, sad, and strangely philosophical in that quirky way teenagers have of looking at the world, I quite enjoyed this one.
January 29, 2010
So what does a young lad do if his mother decides to become a stripper? That’s the question at the heart of the YA title “When the Kissing Never Stops” and it’s made even harder for the teenage hero, Walker, because he is falling in love for the first time. In fact, hormones are zinging all over this little corner of Kansas – Walker’s, his friend Sully’s, his new girlfriend Rachel, his mum’s and all the guys who come to goggle at her in the tacky roadhouse where she works.
Walker finds mental refuge by befriending a cornpoke farmer and working forty acres of land. Mom succeeds in her new job and meets a nice man, and, when Walker finally manages to bring himself to watch her act, he’s relieved to find it’s reasonably fun rather than utterly gross. Mind you, he’s lost his own virginity by then, and so perhaps is a little less interested in mom’s doings than he was. This witty book reflects the way real life seems to work out, and zippy dialogue and believable characters keep you reading all the way through.
Walker finds mental refuge by befriending a cornpoke farmer and working forty acres of land. Mom succeeds in her new job and meets a nice man, and, when Walker finally manages to bring himself to watch her act, he’s relieved to find it’s reasonably fun rather than utterly gross. Mind you, he’s lost his own virginity by then, and so perhaps is a little less interested in mom’s doings than he was. This witty book reflects the way real life seems to work out, and zippy dialogue and believable characters keep you reading all the way through.
October 19, 2012
This is fantastic! A lovely story and terribly funny! So often I would just burst out laughing, I'd write them all down but then they would be out of context and less funny! It is well worth the read! There are only 5 chapters in the book but don't let that put you off cause it is well-paced and interesting, so the pages just keep turning and you don't noticed that the chapters are quite long. It is just such a great story! Loved it!
April 15, 2014
An adventure lacking in description and action, drowning in dialogue that is trying too hard to be witty. Narrated by an amorphous main character whose mind is overwhelmed by sex. Not to mention the entire thing being laced is misogyony and could correctly be titled "Sex, Strippers, and What Teenage Boys Think Girls Act Like but Actually Don't". And yet, I somehow finished it.
December 19, 2022
Ammetto che ciò che mi ha spinta a volere questo libro è stato il fatto che speravo di ritrovare le stesse emozioni da pre-adolescente che mi fecero innamorare di Emily di Christa Laas, edito nella stessa collana nel 2001.
Forse mi sarebbe piaciuto di più se l'avessi letto in quegli anni - o forse mi avrebbe fatto lo stesso effetto di oggi.
Il protagonista è Walker, che si è appena lasciato con Debbie perché questa si è trasferita con la sua famiglia e intanto il suo amico Sully gli vuole presentare Rachel, la nuova ragazza arrivata in città.
E Walker vuole fare una buona impressione soprattutto perché ha qualche chilo di troppo, sua madre si è appena trovata un lavoro come ballerina di burlesque un anno dopo essere rimasta vedova e, non da meno, Walker vuole fare sesso.
Nel frattempo il suo amico Sully è alle prese con il seguire le orme del padre, chirurgo, che gli dice di stare lontano dalle distrazioni e Peggy è una grossa distrazione, soprattutto vista la sua fama in città.
Diciamo che per certi aspetti è un romanzo che sta abbastanza sulla superficie perché ovviamente è rivolto ad un pubblico molto giovane - non poteva essere troppo grafico, anche se essendo raccontato dal punto di vista di un ragazzo quasi all'ultimo anno di liceo i pensieri sul sesso e sulla masturbazione non mancano.
Dall'altra parte però resta appunto superficiale perché il rapporto tra lui e Rachel viene costruito molto frettolosamente e il romanzo quasi si concentra di più sul rapporto tra Walker e sua madre e con se stesso e con il futuro che lo attende che su ciò che effettivamente conta perché tu li possa credere una coppia innamorata - il padre di Rachel oltretutto, con le sue frasi e reazioni abbastanza possessive nel confronti della figlia, mi ha alquanto trasmesso brutte vibrazioni.
È un romanzo datato - non è specificato, ma credo sia ambientato negli stessi anni '90 in cui è stato pubblicato: non esistono cellulari, ci sono i cinema all'aperto con il drive-in, i centri commerciali che svuotano e privano di ricchezza le botteghe del centro cittadino sono ancora visti come una novità e come il male delle piccole città.
Insomma, dato il titolo mi aspettavo qualcosa di più improntato sulle relazioni adolescenziali, sulle paure, sulle prime esperienze e sulle seconde, sulle confidenze tra ragazze e tra ragazzi e invece, come ho detto, resta tutto molto superficiale.
Forse mi sarebbe piaciuto di più se l'avessi letto in quegli anni - o forse mi avrebbe fatto lo stesso effetto di oggi.
Il protagonista è Walker, che si è appena lasciato con Debbie perché questa si è trasferita con la sua famiglia e intanto il suo amico Sully gli vuole presentare Rachel, la nuova ragazza arrivata in città.
E Walker vuole fare una buona impressione soprattutto perché ha qualche chilo di troppo, sua madre si è appena trovata un lavoro come ballerina di burlesque un anno dopo essere rimasta vedova e, non da meno, Walker vuole fare sesso.
Nel frattempo il suo amico Sully è alle prese con il seguire le orme del padre, chirurgo, che gli dice di stare lontano dalle distrazioni e Peggy è una grossa distrazione, soprattutto vista la sua fama in città.
Diciamo che per certi aspetti è un romanzo che sta abbastanza sulla superficie perché ovviamente è rivolto ad un pubblico molto giovane - non poteva essere troppo grafico, anche se essendo raccontato dal punto di vista di un ragazzo quasi all'ultimo anno di liceo i pensieri sul sesso e sulla masturbazione non mancano.
Dall'altra parte però resta appunto superficiale perché il rapporto tra lui e Rachel viene costruito molto frettolosamente e il romanzo quasi si concentra di più sul rapporto tra Walker e sua madre e con se stesso e con il futuro che lo attende che su ciò che effettivamente conta perché tu li possa credere una coppia innamorata - il padre di Rachel oltretutto, con le sue frasi e reazioni abbastanza possessive nel confronti della figlia, mi ha alquanto trasmesso brutte vibrazioni.
È un romanzo datato - non è specificato, ma credo sia ambientato negli stessi anni '90 in cui è stato pubblicato: non esistono cellulari, ci sono i cinema all'aperto con il drive-in, i centri commerciali che svuotano e privano di ricchezza le botteghe del centro cittadino sono ancora visti come una novità e come il male delle piccole città.
Insomma, dato il titolo mi aspettavo qualcosa di più improntato sulle relazioni adolescenziali, sulle paure, sulle prime esperienze e sulle seconde, sulle confidenze tra ragazze e tra ragazzi e invece, come ho detto, resta tutto molto superficiale.
June 7, 2017
Really no big deal. A fellow teacher recommended this... I found this "typical" and much less interesting than other young adult books. Author seems to be trying too hard... like he wanted to be shocking and innovative with his topic, but really ended up being no big thing.
January 16, 2019
I will seek out more of Koertge's work. This is the young adult fiction I needed when I was a teenager--missed it by a few years.
July 21, 2008
WtKNS was an easy read. Walker, the protagonist, "walks" into the story a innocent heartbroken boy who mourns his father's death, his girlfriend's move to another city,his pudgy stomach, and he hates his mother's new job as a stripper. By the story's end, he understands how much his father loved him, he loses the weight that bothered him so much, and he finds another girlfriend, and he understands that his mother's job does not define who she is. Caution: The four main characters in this book talk about SEX a lot.
March 24, 2008
Hm... this book was interesting. Especially the plot, which was talking about the main character's mother working as a stripper...
I think that there were some really good themes in this book, like when it talked about nature, and etc.
Nonetheless very funny!
This author is pretty good, although I do have to say some of the content gets a little edgy sometimes...
I think that there were some really good themes in this book, like when it talked about nature, and etc.
Nonetheless very funny!
This author is pretty good, although I do have to say some of the content gets a little edgy sometimes...
January 7, 2011
Cheers for the reasonable, giddy, normal take on teenage sex from the male point of view and half-hearted cheers for the ham-fisted malls vs. farm plot and the sub-plot of a stripper mother that seems kind of glossed over.
May 5, 2012
The book was okay. Let's just say that if this was a movie, it would be your typical movie about sex from the view of a teenage boy. It focused more on Walker's relationship with the girl and her mother being a stripper was more of a sub-plot.
July 15, 2014
Read this book in high school and again a few months ago. It's still as great a story and I will read it again for sure. The characters are so likeable and the plot is a tad embarrassing but it pulls you in
August 14, 2007
pretty ok. kid's mom becomes an exotic dancer to make ends meet. she likes it. good for you, mom. buck up, kiddo!
July 29, 2008
Everyone, young & old must read this wonderful hilarious coming of age story.
May 12, 2009
Boy thinks his life will end if anyone finds out his mom is a stripper. Author has warped views of how girls act. Waste of time
April 11, 2011
Great dialogue, compelling protagonist. A little predictable, but enjoyable. Realistic fiction, male protagonist, death, romance.
May 7, 2011
A really good novel. Teenage love.
July 3, 2018
07-18-2012
March 29, 2014
Oh man I love Ron Koertge...he's like what I want in Abbi Glines books. Realistic endings...
Displaying 1 - 19 of 19 reviews