Reviews

Who Ran My Underwear Up the Flagpole? by Jerry Spinelli

iceangel9's review against another edition

3.0

A continuation of the School Daze series for those who enjoyed Picklemania and Do the Funky Pickle. Pickles has joined the band, Sunny tries out for cheerleading, Salem becomes the football team's manager, and Eddie goes out for football. Spinelli fans will love this book.

glyptodonsneeze's review against another edition

4.0

I remember laughing so hard when my dad read this to my brother and me, so I was pumped to find it again, but then I was uncomfortable to find that it was written by Jerry Spinelli, the author of Newberry book Maniac Magee, which rubbed me the wrong way in fifth grade. The principle things I remember about WRMUutF are Eddie in class in his underpants and the kiss with the hamster mask on, and the thing I remember about Maniac Magee is that the zookeeper died and Maniac(?) read to his corpse for three days before telling an adult, and I remember the zookeeper was similar to Timothy in The Cay, which we also had to read in fifth grade, as a benign old Black man who acts as a sidekick to white boy in an unrelatable story I didn't care for when I was eleven. I didn't know the term "magical negro" in fifth grade, but I googled it before I read Who Ran and found this essay: http://readingwhilewhite.blogspot.com/2017/09/looking-back-maniac-magee-by-jerry_8.html that confirmed my misgivings about Maniac Magee. Fortunately(?), Who Ran My Underwear up the Flag Pole manages to circumvent Maniac Magee's problematic approach to race by omitting all people of color entirely from the story. Four white kids: Eddie, Pickes, Salem, and Sunny, all try to fit in in sixth grade by associating themselves with the football team and it is damn funny. I did remember the underpants bit correctly, and that was great. I didn't laugh out loud, but apparently I'm an adult and I laugh out loud at the subtle British manners of Angela Thirkell books nowadays, so it's me, not Spinelli. Underpants are still funny. Eddie decides to redeem himself by joining the football team, and Salem becomes the team manager to gain Life Experience, and she moms the little boys who the football coach treats harshly. There's a presentation of gender roles in this text that's questionable, but it's tempered by the sense that sixth graders are little and don't do well when they're yelled at, and it's sweet. There is so much football in this book. So much. I did not remember that two thirds of it is entirely football and it goes on so long until you realize that it's a set-up for the crescendo when the kid vomits on the ball and the other players are gagging and wiping their hands on the grass while Eddie runs down the field as the marching band stomps around on the field trying to form a P and then I did laugh out loud. That was a bloody genius comic series of events. I loved it. Then the four main kids have an eleven-year-old party with fondue and spilling and almost getting to first base. It was a nice way to be a book for young readers. I'm probably not going to read the other three books in the series unless they fall in my hands easily for free again, but I enjoyed this, and the amount of football-related action makes more sense as .16% of four books, and not two thirds of a non-sports book.

stargirlcaraway's review against another edition

5.0

SO ADORABLE. As always, Jerry Spinelli writes the best characters. It makes me really sad that I only have one book left to read in this series.

I'm in love with Pickles Johnson and I wish I could insert myself into the story and be part of this 6th grade gang. I mean really, riding around with your best friends on a surfboard converted into a skateboard that looks like a pickle? Sounds amazing.

Anyways, I laughed out loud a bunch of times while reading this one and was smiling the rest of the time. I love Jerry Spinelli so much.