reply

Chapter 7: Hypercrushing (Noah Youkilis)

I looked up Noah’s figure on marine life—“approximately three-point-five trillion fish on Earth”—because it sounded made-up. I really should stop doubting Noah (and, by extension, GRK). I wonder if Noah has a poster of a Pacific salmon. I hear they’re popular in dorm rooms.

Noah’s summer is shaping up nicely: crushing problems (literally) and early victories (AIDAN wasted no time identifying a couple of Gavelers). Both are almost guaranteed to produce heart trouble—heartache and heartburn—before we’re through summer at Wilderton.

@GRK: I hope the Stink Tank Think Tank’s supplementary report gave ample consideration to scatological citrus experiments.

@Josh: My guess is a few of the Easter Eggs are intentional, most are simply authorial voice and long-running reference points, and a fair number exist only in the minds of readers determined to find symbolism and callbacks in every sentence. (I include myself proudly in that last category.) Trudy Helfield now holds the record for the most obscure character reference in a Kormaniacs Book Club. Well played. I suspect MG authors today have a tighter leash—in the form of publisher and parental oversight—than they did in the 1970s-‘80s. Beyond the casually implied slapstick violence in NCP, Rob and Dennis’s actual mission in that book is essentially the cross-country caravan version of pink blazing. I wouldn’t expect that from a contemporary release.