User:Capt.Knauer1/Draft of Hoot

Plot Summary
Roy Eberheart is the new kid from Montana, no friends, nothing to do, and no idea how much trouble riding the bus would be.

His troubles begin on his first day riding the bus. With his face pushed against the window Roy notices a boy running with "no shoes." After that day Roy continues to look for the boy. Two days after first seeing the boy, Roy sees him again, but before he has the chance to run after the boy, he is grabbed around the neck by Dana Matherson, a well know bully at trace middle school. In an effort to escape Roy punches "blindly over his shoulder, as hard as he could" Finally getting free, Roy chases the barefoot kid to a golf course but looses him due to a golf ball hitting him in the head. The next day Roy was called in to a meeting with the vice-principal for "fighting" on the bus. After missing "his morning classes and most of lunch hour" he hurried through the lunch line and found an empty table where he was confronted by Beatrice Leep, the girl Roy almost knocked over running off the bus. She tells him to give up looking for the barefoot kid, and leave well enough alone.

At the same time Roy's face was being pushed against the bus window a police officer was getting out of his car at a construction lot. Officer David Delinko, who not unlike Roy was being introduced to the beginning of his troubles, Mother Paula's All-American Pancake House. Leroy "Curly" Brandit was the one who placed the call to the police station was there to meet the officer. Curly called to place a vandalism report. Soon after he arrived at the site Delinko left promising to file a report for " trespassing and malicious mischief"

Days later Delinko was called back to the construction site to find out there was still no real vandalism to report, it was just the same as the last time he was there the survey sticks were dug up, but this time someone had let the air out of the tires of all the construction vehicles. Before he left, Delinko noticed some "Travelin' Johnnys" and decided to check them out. To his surprise the vandal hat somehow managed to put alligators in the toilets.

After a meeting with his Captain and Sargent it was announced that there would be a police car at the site every hour. In a private meeting with his Sargent it was decided that Delinko would be on the Case 24/7, working overtime with no extra pay.

After Mullet fingers made his announcement to the owl Leona started having a "pitched a weepy spluttering fit and demanded to be reunited with her son" when she was told she could not get through the wall of protesters. The police officers led her in to the throng of protesters, she was "smothering" and "melodramatic" posing for the cameras. After the rally Roy learns Mullet fingers true name, Napoleon Bridger, from a news paper article about the protests. Due to some help from his dad it is made known that the Mother Paula's cooperation did not turn in an Environmental Impact Statement(E.I.S), which "every big construction project is supposed to do one. That's the Law"

Character Discriptions

 * David Delinko is an officer in the Coconut Cove police department. He is described as being "young" and "pushy" by Roy and his dad. He is the leading, aka only officer investigating the vandalization at the Mother Paula's All-American Pancake House construction site.
 * Leroy "Curly" Brandit is the Foreman on the Mother Paula's All-American Pancake House construction site where all of the mysterious vandalizations happen. By officer David Delinko he is described as being "bald as a beach ball", "cranky", and "unsmiling"
 * Kimberly Lou Dixion is an actress who plays Mother Paula the mascot for Mother Paula's All-American Pancake House.
 * Mr. Ryan is the Social Studies teacher at Trace Middle School

Reception
"In his first novel for a younger audience",Hiaasen, tells a story of a group of teenagers trying to fight for the lives of the small borrowing owls that inhabit the construction site for a pancake house opening in Coconut Cove, Florida. In this book, Hiaasen "successfully cuts his slapstick sense of humor down to kid size." Hiaasen's book is "sure to be a hoot, er, hit with middle school mystery fans".