Jono has a problem. He's just got himself an alligator. His mother is going to kill him. Unless the alligator gets there first.

 In this story Jono is conned into taking an alligator for a pet from a man at a car boot sale. When he takes the creature it is drugged, so sleeping quietly but when it wakes and eats all the food he has just bought from the take-away, he realises the problems he is going to face. He hides it in the car pit of the garage of his mother's boyfriend where it foils an attempted robbery. This turns the trouble he was expecting to erupt, into a reward from Sam for saving his car. Reluctant readers, boys in particular, will like this book. Jono has a very low picture of himself and the reader sense that he has a difficult time at school. Many readers will understand and empathise with his comment "I'm not good with words.....I don't like any of them." and the way that his 'mates' play jokes on him because he doesn't remember words. He doesn't understand their cruelty but the reader does. It reminds me of a similar scene on 'Flowers for Algernon' where Charlie doesn't understand that his 'friends' are mocking him.

At the end, Sam gives Jono twenty pounds but he also tells him "You're a smart boy" and this is a far more important reward for a boy whose self esteem is very low. This leaves the reader feeling that their relationship can develop well in the future, a important hope for his mother who wants Jono to like Sam. These ideas are touched on very lightly but the readers will bring their own knowledge and understanding to a reading of the book and for many it will help them to articulate their own problems.

Finally, students always want to know where authors get their ideas from and the knowledge that this was originally a small comment in a newspaper might also be a useful pointer for readers at this level when they are writing their own narratives.

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2008-06-29