The Second Base Club (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Second Base Club Karen Coats Trine, Greg. The Second Base Club. Holt, 2010. 213p. ISBN 978-0-8050-8967-7 $16.99 Ad Gr. 7-10. Elroy is a hormone-addled sophomore with two goals—stay off the bully radar, and get to at least second base with a girl. His friend Vern can talk to girls even if he doesn't go much farther, and their other best friend, Tuck, rounds the bases easily, but Elroy needs an angle. Sports seem like a good option, since he knows that the jocks in his school have a secret club where they rack up points for sexual exploits. He chooses wrestling, and the meets do bring his estranged parents together and eventually lead to an invite into the jocks' inner circle. It's not until he develops a real friendship with a girl he works with, though, that Elroy begins to understand what having a relationship might mean beyond scoring. Elroy, Vern, and Tuck are all credibly portrayed as boys with more or less one-track minds, and their conversations revolve around typical boy stuff—cars, farts, boobs, and sexual curiosity. Their clumsy ordinariness makes the climax, where Elroy rescues a girl from being drugged and assaulted by the jocks, seem a bit far-fetched, and the character development of everyone other than Elroy and Vern is overly dependent on clichés, but for readers looking for a mildly humorous story about a boy figuring out how the game works and what role he wants to play in it, this serves as a solid two-bagger. [End Page 254] Copyright © 2011 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois