Andrew Smith always impresses me. But of all of his books that I’ve read, Winger and Stand-Off are my favorites because they are funny but still speak to something real. As always with Smith, the main character is a boy, which offers a different perspective from what I usually read. The novels follow Ryan Dean West, a smart kid who’s skipped two grades and attends a boarding school. He’s got a little bit of an artistic bent and draws great little illustrations covering various aspects of his life. He’s also pretty crude and gives us a direct line into the male teen psyche, which is both funny and a teensy bit disturbing. It’s not like I didn’t know that sex is on their minds about 80% of the time, but it’s still funny to see it played out. Still, the male characters feel very real and even relatable.
Ryan Dean’s in a slightly awkward position since he’s younger than his peers (his cohort, I guess I could say). At the beginning of Winger, his best friend is a girl named Annie, and unsurprisingly he’s in love with her, but as he’s just fourteen and she’s sixteen, she (also unsurprisingly) thinks he’s just a kid. Ryan Dean also has to play a sport—and he chooses rugby, which is interesting because it’s a pretty tough game. I’m not giving anything important away if I tell you there’s a pretty funny and unquestionably painful scene where Ryan Dean’s crotch gets stepped on by a heavy cleat, which actually causes bleeding. Poor guy. Throughout the course of his junior year, he also becomes really good friends with an older boy named Joey, who serves as a bit of a mentor while Ryan Dean makes some pretty bad choices along the way. When something really terrible happens at the end of the book, Ryan Dean’s grown up some so he can handle it a little better than he might have earlier.
But he doesn’t handle it all that well, and that carries us into the sequel, Stand Off. In this one, he’s a fifteen-year-old senior but he gets stuck with an annoying twelve-year-old freshman roommate in one of the the smallest dorm rooms on campus. The powers that be at the school figure Ryan Dean will be great for helping the kid—Sam—adjust to life at the school. He resents this, since he’s spent his whole time there trying to transcend the age difference. By now, he’s managed to convince Annie to be his girlfriend, so things should looking up, even if Sam is a little fixated on her, himself. Ryan Dean’s also been made captain of the rugby team, which brings its own set of challenges. Most importantly, the troubles of the last year are still haunting him, leaving him with some genuine problems he’s afraid to face head-on. The novel takes us through that year, with him finally dealing with everything by getting the help he needs to make it happen.
I really can’t recommend these books enough.