Moving to a new town is no fun for Trevor Ladd, and it only gets worse when he protects a nursing home patient from the neighborhood bullies. Walking home from school, he catches the bullies throwing snowballs at a withered old man named Petey. As he chases them off, he can't imagine that his life is about to change.

Petey has spent his life in institutions. Born with cerebral palsy, he was misdiagnosed as an infant and grew up in mental institutions. As an adult, he is bound by his wheelchair and struggles to communicate with the people around him. But Petey sees something in Trevor and is determined to become his friend -- and Trevor soon learns that there is more to Petey than meets the eye.

Petey is a touching story of friendship, discovery, and the domination of the human spirit over physical obstacles.

Reviews

Gr 7-12-Actor L.J. Ganser provides a superb narration of Ben Mikaelsen's touching story (Hyperion, 1998) about a man who lives his entire life institutionalized because of cerebral palsy, yet manages to maintain and share a real love of life. The story begins in 1922, when the infant Petey is delivered to the Warm Springs Insane Asylum in Montana by parents who are unable to cope with his disabilities. He is misdiagnosed as an "idiot," and thought to be completely incapable of learning or comprehension. Petey grows up in Warm Springs, often in misery, but finds occasional moments of joy in the wind on his face, birds outside the window, a family of mice and, eventually, other people. Another young inmate, Calvin, is about Petey's age and is mildly retarded, but he helps Petey find a voice and becomes a true friend. The second half of the book takes place in a nursing home in Bozeman, MT, where Petey has been moved after a major reorganization of the state hospital system. There Petey is befriended by an eighth-grader who grows to love Petey and adopts him as his grandfather. Ganser does a good job of creating distinct voices for the characters, particularly Petey, who speaks only in a few guttural phrases. Also included is an interview with the author who discusses his relationship with Clyde Cothern, the real-life inspiration for the book, and suggests ways that young people can make a difference in the lives of older people by visiting nursing homes. Petey was a 1999 Best Book for Young Adults and has been nominated for children's choice awards in several states. This recording will win new fans for Petey and for Mikaelsen.-Sarah Flowers, Santa Clara County Library, Morgan Hill, CA Copyright 2000 Cahners Business Information.

A writer admired for fast-paced adventure stories like Stranded and Sparrow Hawk Red takes on a more serious topic in this novel about the relationship between a teenager and a man mistakenly institutionalized for much of his life. Part one of the novel relates Petey's "backstory": in 1922, at the age of two, his distraught parents commit him to the state's insane asylum, unaware that their son is actually suffering from severe cerebral palsy. Petey avoids withdrawal and depression despite the horrific conditions in his new "home" and, over the course of 60 years, a string of caretakers befriends but then leaves him. The point of view in part two shifts from Petey to Trevor, an eighth-grader suffering from both lack of friends and lack of parental attention after a series of moves. Trevor finds the answer to his needs in an unlikely friendship with the 70-year-old Petey, who has moved to a nursing home. Mikaelson capably highlights the abuses and prejudices suffered by those stricken with cerebral palsy, but teeters dangerously over the line between poignancy and sentimentality. At its best, the third-person narration makes readers privy to the thoughts of the two protagonists, but more often it keeps them at bay ("As people escaped civilization to enjoy the solitude of a mountain peak, so also did many of the patients' minds escape existence and find solitude beyond the reaches of the ward"). As a result, the characters never really come to life beyond their roles as symbolsÄPetey that of the power of the human spirit, Trevor that of the tolerant, unprejudiced do-gooder. A novel that never meets the promise of its compelling premise. Ages 10-up. (Sept.)