Title: Egghead
Author: Caroline Pignat
First Copyright Date: 2008
Genre: (Teen) Fiction
General Subject Matter: bullying and the confusion that is high school
Interesting Fact: Multiple first-person. Three different people tell it how it is
Price: $11.95 CDN, or borrow it from MW’s library!
Egghead is a book about bad-boy-meets-good-girl, bad-boy-likes-good-girl, bad-boy-becomes-good-boy-for-good-girl, all the while trying to help another
kid from being bullied. Egghead is not a book I would read again, but it was a good enough read. It was not really my type of book; I felt that it was
too juvenile for me. There were a couple of times that I was fully into Egghead/u>, but for the rest of the book I was just reading without feeling.
Will Reid is not a normal kid. Will loves ants, wears fake turtlenecks, and absolutely hates gym. On the first day of high school, he is a flashing target for
school bullies Shane, Devan, and Brad. Katie has been Will’s friend since elementary school, but she’s tired of defending him day in and day out. Since he
first saw Katie defending Will, Devan has slowly come to realize that backing up Shane in his attacks is mindless and nasty. Then Shane does something
horrible to Will, and neither Devan nor Katie could help him.
The author of Egghead, Caroline Pignat, took experiences from her own life. As a young girl, she witnessed a certain boy in her class who was always
bullied. She had wondered about the consequences if she had interfered. Egghead is written in one of my favourite styles: multiple first person. I
don’t even think that’s the correct literary term, I don’t even think that there is a correct literary term. Let me go Google that. Yeah I was right. What
I’m trying to say is that each chapter is from the perspective of Will, Katie, or Devan. This kind of narrative is my favourite because in a single situation,
no one could think the same thoughts. Will relates to the readers with enigmatic poems, rather than dialogue or
anecdotes. It shows how different he is. Will receives the nickname Egghead after yelling at Shane for squishing a pregnant ant and her eggs.
Besides multiples first person, what I liked about Egghead were the chapter headings. They are different fonts, and I think the fonts reflect the
nature of the characters. Will has his full name (William James Reid) in a techy, streamlined kind of font. This tells me that Will is a formal, smart kid,
smarter than people give him credit for. Katie has just her first name, italicized in a cursive kind of font. This shows that she is gentle. Devan’s solid,
bold, block letters show that he is strong and somewhat stubborn. I liked how all strings were ties, and there was not a feeling of something left unfinished
at the end.
What I didn’t like about Egghead was the lack of imagery. Not much about the setting was described or even the appearance of main characters. All I
know is that Will is scrawny, Katie is tiny and has red hair and freckles, and Devan has blue eyes. Also, I didn’t like the awkward use of slang language. I
can see that Pignat wants to portray a teenager but she uses slang that isn’t really used in popular culture like “s’up” and “lid”. Pignat also overuses
“man” and “holy crap”, which ruins scenes for me. There weren’t a lot of highs and lows in Egghead; it was level for a really long time. The only
exciting scene was three quarters of the way through the book. I put the genre of this book as (Teen) Fiction because I think it would be better suited
for preteens and those still in elementary school. Once you reach high school and have passed the first year, you don’t want to read about “niners”.
Overall, I’d rate Egghead a 6.5 out of 10. Although there wasn’t much imagery and terms were overused, there weren’t any questions I had
to ask in the end. Everything was tied up and covered. The point-five is for the multiple first person :)
This is one of my favourite poems from Egghead, written by William James Reid:
No Difference
I am
Not at all that different
From you.
Unless you consider that
I am
The only one
Who isn’t
Trying to be the
Same.
Caroline Pignat was born in Ireland, raised in Ottawa but now lives in Kanata, Ontario, with her husband and their two children. She started writing in
Grade 4, and has kept every diary since. Before becoming an author, she worked as an elementary teacher, a book seller, a grocery store cashier, a medical
transcriptionist, and Santa’s elf (yes, the real Santa). She also worked as a bank teller for six years and was only robbed at gunpoint three times.
Egghead is her first young adult novel.
Find more about her here: Caroline Pignat
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