THE CRAZY SCHOOL
By Cornelia Read
Grand Central Publishing (Hatchette Book Group), 2008 ($23.99)
ISBN-10: 044658259X
ISBN-13: 978-0-446-58259-9
Reviewed by Shirley Wetzel
Madeline Dare and hubby Dean moved from the gritty rust belt city of Syracuse to the tranquil Berkshires in western Massachusetts on the promise of a better job for Dean. When the job doesn’t pan out, Maddie has to bring in the bacon. She takes a teaching job at the Santangelo Academy, a place for disturbed -- and disturbing -- high school kids. It doesn’t take her long to sense something is rotten in the state of Massachusetts. The school has some unusual practices -- everyone associated with it must take therapy, including the staff and the children’s parents. Failure to do so results in harsh punishments. Maddie hasn’t had a lot of experience in this field, but she knows things just aren’t right, and, being Maddie, she has to challenge the system.
Maddie becomes attached to the kids, and is devastated when two of them die, in what Dr. Santangelo insists is a double suicide pact. When Maddie and Lula, her only ally at the school, try to find out what really happened, they are quickly, and in Maddie’s case, violently, discouraged. Not that a little attempted murder will stop our girl. Instead of quitting, she accepts a promotion, more determined than ever to find out the truth about the alleged suicides and help the troubled teens she cares about so much.
Very serious issues are at stake in the book, and they are handled with sensitivity, but there’s also some dang fine humor. Maddie gets along great with the kids because she identified with them. She can cuss with the best of them, hold her own in a sarcasm contest, and tell them which roar of the MGM lion to use to start the Pink Floyd song when watching The Wizard of Oz while stoned. They trust her, and when the chips are down they have her back.
This is the second entry in the Madeline Dare series, and it is every bit as fine as Read’s first, A FIELD OF DARKNESS, nominated for the Edgar Award. I predict Ms. Read has a very bright future as a writer. The very talented Lee Child agrees with me, so I know I’ll be proven right. Anyone who quotes Arlo Guthrie and his iconic song, Alice’s Restaurant, is a winner in my book.
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