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Overview
Lots of people think Doug Hanson is a freak -- he gets beat up after school, and the girl of his dreams calls him a worm. Doug's only refuge is creating an elaborate bridge for the model railroad in his basement and hanging out with his best friend, Andy Morrow, a popular football star who could date any girl in school. Doug and Andy talk about everything -- except what happened at the Tuttle place a few years back.
It does not matter to Andy that we live in completely different realities. I'm Andy's best friend. It does not matter to Andy that we hardly ever actually do anything together.
As Doug retreats deeper and deeper into his own reality, long-buried secrets threaten to destroy both Doug and Andy -- and everything else in Doug's fragile world.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781439107041 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Simon & Schuster |
| Publication date: | 02/13/2024 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 170 |
| Lexile: | 730L (what's this?) |
| File size: | 2 MB |
| Age Range: | 12 - 17 Years |
About the Author
Pete Hautman (b. 1952) is an American novelist. Born in Berkeley, California, Hautman moved to Minnesota when he was six. He attended college at the Minneapolis College of Art and Design and the University of Minnesota, and went on to work in marketing and graphic design. Dissatisfied with his work, Hautman turned to fiction, writing his first novel, Drawing Dead, in 1993. A rollicking story of an ex-cop whose gambling gets him into trouble, it was the first of five novels starring Joe Crow, Sam O'Gara, and Axel Speeter. Besides writing mysteries, Hautman has had success writing young adult and middle school fiction. In 2004, he won the National Book Award for Godless, a young adult novel about a pair of teens who start a religion based on worshipping a local water tower. Hautman’s recent novels include Blank Confession (2010), The Big Crunch (2011), and What Boys Really Want (2012).
Read an Excerpt
Invisible
By Pete Hautman
Simon & Schuster Children's Publishing
Copyright © 2005 Pete HautmanAll right reserved.
ISBN: 0689868006
Chapter One: My Best Friend
There is something about trains. The sound they make. The way they go by, one car after another after another after another. Every car different but somehow the same. And the tracks go on forever, connecting places, connecting people. Wherever you are, you could go to the nearest railroad track right now, and if you followed it long enough, you would find me.
There is another thing to know about trains. They are large and dangerous. They would crush you if they could, but they are confined by those two narrow strips of steel. Trains are like fire. You don't want to get in their way.
My grandfather left me his HO scale model railroad when he passed on. One locomotive, seven cars, and sixteen feet of track. That's another reason I like trains -- they connect me to him, wherever he is. You could say that my railroad, the Madham Line, is almost the most important thing in my life. Next to Andy Morrow, my best friend.
A guy like Andy might have more than one best friend. He is so popular that there are at least five kids at school who would probably claim him. But if you asked Andy who was his best friend, he would say, "Dougie Hanson, of course." And that would be me.
I'm a quiet kid, pretty much invisible -- except if you happen to notice me standing next to Andy. We grew up together, Andy and me. Next door, actually. We met at the age of one year and three months. Our birthdays are only seventeen days apart. We are like Velcro, like two poles of a magnet, like peanut butter and jelly, like superglue. We are best friends by every definition. Best friends. Best. Friends.
It doesn't matter to Andy Morrow that I have crooked teeth and poor coordination and wear stupid clothes. It wouldn't matter if I had a nose like a pig and smelled of Limburger cheese. Andy would still say, "Dougie is my best friend."
True, Andy might spend more time with other kids who claim to be his best friend. He might hang with the other football players, and his friends on the student council, and his golfing friends, and his theater friends, but he always comes home at night and opens his bedroom window and calls out across the low picket fence, "Hey, Dougie!"
And if my window is open, and if I'm awake, we talk.
It does not matter that we don't spend as much time together as we used to. I tell Andy all about the new tank car I bought for the Madham Line. I might talk about my mother's latest crossword puzzle, or a book I read about black holes, or a math test I took in school, and Andy would listen. That is what best friends do.
And if Andy wants to talk about the school play he is starring in, or his latest football game, or a girl he met...I'll listen to him, too.
It does not matter to Andy that we live in completely different realities. I'm Andy's best friend. It does not matter to Andy that we hardly ever actually do anything together.
Why should it? We are best friends, me and Andy. Best. Friends.
Copyright © by 2005 Peter Hautman
Continues...
Excerpted from Invisible by Pete Hautman Copyright © 2005 by Pete Hautman. Excerpted by permission.
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