Maniac Magee

By: Jerry Spinelli

Maniac Magee is a story about a boy named Jeffrey Lionel Magee whose parents died when he was little.  He moved in with his aunt and uncle, but they fought all the time.  Maniac ran away to Twin Mills where there was an East end for “white” people and a West end for “black” people.  He met a girl named Amanda on her way to school.  He borrowed a book from her and promised to bring it back.
He did many things that were said to be impossible and he was then known as Maniac Magee.  He tried to return the book but he was threatened by a kid named Mars Bar. Amanda came and helped him and he was invited to go over to her house for a while.  When they took him home, they found out he didn’t have a home and he was invited to live with them.
He had lots of fun living with them but after a while the “black” people wanted him to leave.  He thought about running away but Amanda stopped him and gave him the idea to untie a really long knot called Cobbles Knot.  Nobody had ever untied it before and if someone untied it they got unlimited pizza for a year. He untied it, but he still ran away.  Maniac was found by an old man in the zoo.  The old man (Grayson) got to know him and he was invited to live with the Grayson.  Maniac refused and he lived in a little shack whose address was 101 Band Shell Boulevard.  He celebrated holidays with Grayson and they become great friends. Grayson taught Maniac how to be really good at baseball.  For Christmas, Grayson got Maniac a baseball glove.  Soon after, Grayson died.
After that Maniac ran away and met two boys planning to go to Mexico.  Their names were Russell and Piper McNabb.  The day that they were going to Mexico, Maniac said they could get a free large pizza without stealing it.  When they go to Cobble’s Corner Maniac presents his coupon to the cashier and gets a free pizza.

I thought that this book was really good.  It was about a kid who didn’t have the best of luck and didn’t have a home to even live in.  Maniac overcame a lot in this book.  One question I had was why didn’t his aunt and uncle look for him at all.  Overall I really liked the book and I would recommend it to anybody. 

I decided to read Maniac Magee because I was looking through my books I own and  I decide I would read this because I read Maniac Magee before and I thought that this was a good book, so I read it.  I really liked this book.  For some reason my favorite character is Grayson the old man who works as the gardener person.  He just seemed sort of mysterious, that’s why I liked him.  I would recommend this to anybody who would like a book to read.  I also like Jerry Spinelli’s books, so I would definitely like this one, probably his most famous.