A Semester in the Life of a Garbage Bag

by Gordon Korman

When luckless Raymond Jardine becomes Sean Delancey's eleventh-grade-English project partner, he persuades Sean's grandfather to pose as a long-deceased, obscure Canadian poet, in an effort to pass the course and win a vacation to a luxurious Greek island.

Genres: Young Adult, Fiction, Humor, Canada, Childrens, School, Teen

257 pages, Paperback

First published January 1, 1987

About the author

Gordon Korman is a Canadian author of children's and young adult fiction books. Korman's books have sold more than 30 million copies worldwide over a career spanning four decades and have appeared at number one on The New York Times Best Seller list.

Reviews

[Carey · Rating 4 out of 5]

When will Gavin Gunhold finally get the literary recognition he deserves?

[AquaMoon · Rating 5 out of 5]

What I want is a Where Are They Now-type cast reunion of this book. I can only guess:

Raymond: After his visit to Theamalops, his luck did, indeed, change for the better. During the last years of the 20th Century, he made his first billion in the dot.com industry...and then promptly lost the majority of it when said industry collapsed. But not all was lost. He is now a YouTube Sensation, capitalizing on "goof"/"epic fail" videos. He is more commonly known as "The Don't Try This At Home Guy." He is currently filming his first movie based on said YouTube series. Critics expect it to be the Blockbuster Hit of the Summer, and talks of a sequel are already in the works. He and wife Helga, a model whom he met in Theamalpos, are expecting their first child (whom they plan to name Gavin).

Sean: "Peaked" in high school, after which he went on to have an unremarkable college career in general business. He is now single and working middle management somewhere in Jersey. Most nights, he can be found downing Buds at his favorite Blue Collar Bar, spouting stories about his glory days to anyone who will listen (usually this is just Tony the bartender).

Gramps: After the whole SAGGEN Incident, he received no fewer than 5 six-figure publishing deals, 3 for Really Bad Poetry and 2 for his life story. He used the money from said deals to purchase his old block. Following his passing in 1999, his former building was turned into a monument dedicated to this late, great artist/performer. Unconfirmed rumor has it Robert De Niro is in talks to play him in an upcoming movie based on his life.

Howard: He is currently employed in the field of Renewable Energy, working hard every day to build a YOU better Windmill. I love me a good irony...don't you?

Ashley Signed on for a lucrative modeling career shortly after returning from Themalpos, but gave it up after five years when she and husband, Steve, welcomed their first child. She is currently spearheading Poet-Trees, a non-profit organization that helps fights illiteracy among students in low-income areas by having said students write poetry, plant trees, and read poetry to said trees.

Cementhead: Went on to play professional Ice Hocky and became famous for "being able to take a hit better than Rocky Balboa." After five successful seasons, four of which he led his team to victory, he sustained a career-ending injury, forcing an early retirement. He, his wife, Ashley, and son Cementhead Jr., are now living in Hawaii, where there is no ice to speak of.

Danny: Where else? He's in politics. And a failure at it to boot. And he is as slimy as ever. He has been in and out of AA and is currently struggling not to take that 13th step back to the beginning.

Mindy: After a very messy divorce from ex-husband, Danny, she got into politics herself. Rumor has it she is on the fast-track to becoming the first female president (news which sent her ex to fall back off the wagon). She currently resides in Washington D.C. with her life partner, Meredith, and their dogs, Buffy and Angel.

Gavin Gunhold Is still dead. But following the events of the story, a Moose Head monument was erected at the sight of his untimely demise. It has become the site of yearly pilgrimages for Bad Poets everywhere.

[Jaze Danelver · Rating 5 out of 5]

"A garbage bag hooked up to a hydraulic press, doing his best not to fall apart despite the guy who keeps turning the knob up."

Gordon Korman has been one of my favorite authors of all time and reading his works is always a delight. A Semester in the Life of a Garbage Bag was a fun read and never once in the book I found anything dull to read.

The humor, the plot, and the characters are similar to his other works such as the Mcdonald Hall series and I Want to Go Home!: Two MCs, one off-the-wall character with zany ideas who is either stuck-up and think he's superior to anyone or just someone highly motivated to the point that he seems out of touch with reality, and one is a pushover but a fiercely loyal but lovable sidekick to the crazy character and both of them are stuck in a situation they are trying to get out of/ achieving a certain goal while battling other obstacles that are keeping them from reaching it. These two characters then plan out elaborate ideas on how to achieve their goal but something always end up wrong and the more the two MCs are trying to get things back on track, the more the mess they made grew until eventually they give up their goal and come to terms with it only for them to end up getting what they wanted in the first place in the most unexpected way possible.

I'm going to go ahead and say this is one of those books that portray high school kids as simply high school kids. Like they weren't portrayed in a way that adults portray high kids in movies and books. It was pretty refreshing to see high school kids act their age in this book. Gordon is a brilliant writer and I'm amazed that when he wrote this book, he was just in his early 20s but he already published a lot of successful books (Mcdonald Hall series, anyone?) and yet he was on a roll publishing a good humorous book that both kids and adults will have a good laugh. He knows how to write situational comedy with some farce sprinkled in to make his story ridiculously fun.

This is one of those books which no matter how many times I read it, I will never get tired of it. Plus, it doesn't hurt that it's not a very thick book.

The quote I added above struck me as something I could relate on, as weird as it sounds, but if you really think about it, we are all like a garbage bag trying hard not to fall apart no matter how much pressure we're put into. Huh.

5 stars always.

[Daniel · Rating 5 out of 5]

I thought it was good. I especially liked the cutting edge poetry. It was a lot like Korman's other book the son of Interflux
Reread: I reread this on a whim the other day after only having read it once when I was twelve. I hadn't realised just how brilliant the book was the first time. On the surface, Gordon's characters can often seem one-dimensional, but I was struck by his ability to subtly characterise relationships and personality traits that the characters don't express through their words nor are mentioned by the narration. For example, we see Jardine's mother for only one scene in the whole book, but through the way she acts and the way she interacts with Jardine, as well as some details of past events that characters relate objectively, we seem to get a whole picture of Jardine's home life and their relationship. Another clever element was the way characters wouldn't get what they thought they wanted at the conclusion, but would still be satisfied, which is much more the way things often work in real life. Like (spoilers): Sean not getting together with Ashley but being pleased he could be a good friend to Steve, them getting a c on the poetry project for effort, Sean's parents becoming equally nutty about being anti-technology as they were the whole time for it, SACGEN being rebuilt. In fact, the only plotline that didn't have one of these more realistic endings was the Theamelpos line, which, Korman knew, could only end the way it did. In this way, it's similar to elements from Son of Interflux like where Simon doesn't even come close to winning the Vishnik prize, but does paint a piece that dumbfounds even his eccentric painting mentor. I've read other Korman books, but these two stand out by far, both in entertainment and literary merit. Anything he wrote after the 80s usually disappoints me, but this may be because they're written for a younger audience.
I mentioned in Wodehouse's Leave it to Psmith I wanted to see more books lauding eccentricity; this is a theme which is definitely present in this book with characters like Jardine and Patrick Delancey.

[Nick · Rating 5 out of 5]

Another great book by Gordon Korman from the late 80s early 90s. I learned so many things from this book - talking about myself in the first person, writing poetry under pressure, the joy of watching the weather channel. Many a night I spent watching stormfronts with Dana Levenson on the Weather Network. I truly think that my comfort in writing my wife little love poems is a direct result of Gavin Gunhold's method of poetry writing - take a random work from an encyclopedia and run with it. I cannot recommend this book highly enough.

[Michelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

A high school favorite.. silly and out of print. I no longer feel bad about not returning it to the WCHS library.

[Jess · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this multiple times when I was a teenager and every time it made me laugh out loud so hard that my mother got annoyed (some of us have housework to do and can't sit around reading funny books all day!). I have since realized, as a mother and head-kitchen-cleaner type of person myself, that housework is a lot more bearable if you make time to read in between(or occasionally instead of) vacuuming and wiping down the counters.

I only vaguely remember that this book involves some sort of madcap adventure between various high school social outcasts and yet I can still heartily recommend it. The fact that it's out of print is a reflection of everything that's wrong with our society. Go find a library that still stocks it or find a used copy online. You won't be sorry.

If you're able to read this entire drink while drinking milk without snorting it out of your nose at least once (the milk, not the book),I will give you a medal.

[Liz · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is a masterpiece.

My Goodreads followers know I don’t normally post reviews. This book is a masterpiece. I first read it in high school, and I enjoyed the hell out of reading it again.

[Kate McMurry · Rating 5 out of 5]

Hilarious, middle-grade comedy of errors from 1987

Sad-sack protagonist Raymond Jardine constantly refers to himself in the third person throughout this middle-grade novel. This is how he describes himself, as the titular "garbage bag":

"Have you ever seen the commercial for garbage bags, where they test the strength of the bag by seeing how many pounds of pressure they can put on it before it breaks? That's Jardine, a garbage bag hooked up to a hydraulic press, doing his best not to fall apart, in spite of the guy who keeps turning the knob up."

Raymond considers himself the most unlucky person on the planet. But he has a plan to turn all that around. He is convinced that he absolutely must win a contest sponsored by his high school, for six winning students to travel to Theamelpos, a fictional, beautiful Greek island, for the summer. He firmly believes a visit to this fabulous place will transform his perpetual bad luck into good luck from now on, because there are many documented cases of it having happened to other visitors. A major stumbling block to winning the contest is earning a decent grade for the second semester of the year in his eleventh-grade English class. This cannot possibly happen unless he gets a C or above for a huge paper about a poet.

In a classic example of the popular "enemies to friends" buddy-comedy trope, Raymond's teacher pairs him up with a boy who is his dead opposite. Sean Delancey is smart, handsome, athletic, and popular. He is basically as fortunate as any guy could possibly be. The two of them are also paired with Ashley, a beautiful model in the same class, whom both Raymond and Sean instantly develop a huge crush on, in spite of the fact that they assume she is not too smart, quite lazy, and will probably contribute nothing to their project.

In hopes that their choice of poet will stand out so much to their teacher they will have a better chance of getting a decent grade, Raymond frantically searches for as obscure a poet as possible for their subject. Unfortunately, he does not discover a likely candidate until the day before the deadline their teacher has set for turning in their selection. As a result, they do not learn, until it is too late to choose an alternative, that the Canadian poet Raymond chose died in 1949, after having published only one poem.

To save their grade, the ever-inventive Raymond comes up with the crazy idea to have Sean's 88-year-old grandfather masquerade as the dead poet, as well as Sean and Raymond themselves writing several poems to add to the supposed repertoire of the poet. However, they do not confide in Ashley about this scheme, because neither boy believes that chatty Ashley can keep a secret. But, much to Sean's surprise and Raymond's delight, Gramps is so charismatic, and Ashley turns out to be such a great promoter, he becomes a nationwide, talk-show sensation.

This delightfully nutty comedy of errors was published the same year as "Don't Care High," and, amazingly, it is even more hilarious. I lost track of how many times I laughed out loud while romping through this book. It is full of comic exaggeration within the many witty conversations between Raymond and Sean, and in the adorably clever scenes involving Gramps, who is a fabulous addition to the novel.

In TV and movie comedies, it is typical to see an interplay between comic characters, who range from slightly quirky to grotesquely bizarre, and straight-person characters, who represent rational reality. In this novel, there are two central pairings with this dynamic: Raymond is the comic character juxtaposed with Sean's "straightman" character. Gramps is a comic character most frequently juxtaposed with Ashley's straight character, because she doesn't find out until the very end of the novel that he's an imposter.

Though geared toward children, readers of all ages will enjoy this side-splitting story.

[diytrasha · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this over 10 years ago (I would be remiss if I didn't mention that this was my sister's favourite book as a kid) and wow, it still holds up. A Semester in the Life of a Garbage Bag is hilarious, but not even in a quotable way—the characters and the storyline are just completely ridiculous. That being said, I will flag this book for some casual misogyny (a term I usually abhor), but the characters are so earnest that I can easily forgive Korman.

[Rena Sherwood · Rating 5 out of 5]

The 1980s were a highly tense, crazy time. This book, published in 1987, captures that, with a slightly humorous twist.

I say only slightly humorous because I graduated high school in 1987, so many of the jokes hit too close to home. I was forced to go to a strict Christian school since the 4th grade, and lost the faith by the time I grabbed my useless diploma. My parents, my teachers, President Reagan, his supporters -- just about everyone around me was bug-fucking nuts. I felt not just frustrated, but helpless to do anything about it.

This feeling is captured perfectly by Gordon Korman. DeWitt High is host to a $33 million Department of Energy program... which causes chaos in school every day. And the 1980s had scores of projects like that that cost taxpayers billions. No adult believes the kids when they complain of the constant power failures.

The book is told mostly in the point of view of basketball star Sean, whose life goes into a complete tailspin when he's flung together with Raymond Jardine, an asshole who always refers to himself in the third person. I couldn't help but think of him as a tiny American version of Blackadder. And if you have no idea who Blackadder is, stop reading this and go watch every episode of "Blackadder" that you can.

Because Raymond has a cunning plan for just about anything and everything, so he can spend the summer on an obscure Greek island instead of working at gutting fish for his Uncle in Seacaucas again.

Remember, kids -- sometimes it pays to be an utter bastard. And really, that was the most important lesson of the 1980s.

Extra star for the David Bowie reference, and some poems even Charles Bukowski would've liked.

[Monique · Rating 4 out of 5]

Ok honestly i loved it.
This was the vibe 'who is bugs potter?' tried to give. This was better.
I can't do 5 stars only because of how ridiculous (and funny) the plot got. Impersonating a dead person probably would have more consequences today. And it was so slow in the beginning.
The moment of friendship that is born out of aggravation... I loved it, quotes to be added later.

[izzy marie · Rating 4 out of 5]

it was okay. it was so ridiculous that it was funny. is probably read it again.

[Child960801 · Rating 5 out of 5]

I know I read this one as a kid, when I read any Gordon Korman book I could get hold of, but I hadn't thought of it in years. I picked it up for a reread because I needed a book by a Canadian author for a reading challenge and Korman's early stuff just makes me laugh so hard.

Sean meets Raymond when they are assigned as partners for an English assignment and his life takes a turn for the strange.

[Douglas Summers-Stay · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this aloud to Daniel in the hospital from cover to cover. We've both read it at least twice before (my first time was in junior high), but it remains a favorite. Son of Interflux is my favorite Gordon Korman, but this one is a strong second-- the amazing poetry of Gavin Gunhold putting it above other contenders like Don't Care High or Losing Joe's Place.
Korman's technique in these books is to give ordinary characters in a mundane environment slightly strange goals, and as they try to achieve them, at each point they can make a choice, have them decide to up the ante. Soon they have involved the entire community in their schemes and things have gotten downright absurd. And then things get notched up again. And again.
There are some odd choices I didn't notice before: Why do they hate the class president who claims credit for organizing the party when he did nothing, when they themselves get credit for organizing the party and do nothing? Why is the main character a popular sports star who thinks he deserves the girl because of who he is? Why, instead of getting away with the poet scam entirely or getting caught and failed, do we get a half-victory/half-defeat and a C grade? Why is the book anti-solar-and-wind power? Why is everyone between 20 and 70 years old an obstacle?
There's also something off-kilter about where Korman places the central story vs what the strongest story is. In Son of Interflux, for example, the central conflict is with Interflux, but the best stories are the ones surrounding the student film Omni and the insane art teacher. Here, the strongest story by far is about the poet, but that's really treated as a side quest towards defeating SACGEN and getting to Theamelpos. It's a more complicated book than it first appears.

[Kaleigh · Rating 5 out of 5]

I LOVE this book, and no one has ever heard of it.

It's the story of Sean Delacey, high school junior, athlete, all around good student whose school is the test pilot for a new solar powered energy unit, that doesn't work. One day he's partnered with Raymond Jardine for a poetry assignment in English class. Jardine has absolutely zero luck, his goal is to win a school sponsered summer trip to the island of Theamopolos, where he can get some luck. Jardine is genuinly convinced that a good English grade is the key to his winning the trip - so he and Sean set out to take an original take on the poetry project with a random poem they find in the library at the last minute. I won't give anything else away becasue I do recommend this book, even though it's kinda kiddy - it's a quick hour long read but it has me cracking up each time at the hijinks the boys get into trying to get through high school, complete their disastrous poetry assigment (the poet only wrote one poem. and then he died,so they write more.... and then since they have no research, they claim they know the poet and try to pass sean's grandfather off as him - things spin WILDLY out of control), and beat the defective solar generator.

this is a lame description, but it's a hilarious little book. if you ever see it in a used bookstore i recommend you pick it up.

[J · Rating 5 out of 5]

A SEMESTER IN THE LIFE OF A GARBAGE BAG
- BY GORDON KORMAN

Jardine and Delancey are on a mission.

Get to Theamelpos by any means possible.

This may include, but is by no means limited to:


> kissing up to their Principal

> tolerating their stuck-up student president

> Forging poetry for their English project

> Starting the only hockey team in the state

> keeping that one cute girl away from the school muscle-head

> not necessarily in that order

[Stephanie · Rating 4 out of 5]

Still great. (Reread January 2017.)

[Cyndi · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was so much fun!! The all-around popular boy in high school gets put together with the self acclaimed unluckiest boy ever. Hilarity ensues!

[Joanne · Rating 5 out of 5]

One of my earliest favorites. A zany 80s classic. I wish someone would make this into a movie! :-D

[William Leight · Rating 4 out of 5]

The third in what I think of as Korman's 80's New York high school trilogy (though admittedly the books share nothing beyond that fairly general setting) along with "Don't Care High" and "Son of Interflux", "A Semester in the Life of a Garbage Bag" is to my mind the weakest of the three, though still quite enjoyable. The titular garbage bag is Jardine: first name Raymond, but referred to as Jardine by everyone, including himself in the third person. The title is explained early on, when Jardine compares himself to a garbage bag in an infomercial, being stuffed full of garbage to see how much it can hold: in this not-entirely-successful metaphor, the garbage is bad luck, of which Jardine has far more than his share. But he has a plan to reverse his bad luck by going to the (imaginary) Greek island of Theamelpos, and can recite chapter and verse of the many schmoes whose lives turned into an unending series of lucky breaks after they visited it. He hopes to get there using the Nassau County high school summer travel program which sends 6 students per school there. To do that, he needs a good grade in English, which means doing well on a modern poetry project that is worth 60% of his grade, and thus it is that his partner in that project, Sean Delancey, is sucked into a series of increasingly hare-brained schemes to ensure that Jardine gets that trip. You may wonder why the Nassau County high schools sponsor a summer trip to a Greek tourist island, or puzzle over the high school English teacher who makes a single project worth more than half of the grade for his class, but none of the books in the high school trilogy are particularly concerned with realistically depicting the high school experience. One of this novel's weaknesses is precisely that Korman doesn't even gesture towards an explanation for why this is, such as he did in setting "Son of Interflux" at a performing arts magnet school.

And this seems to matter more because the book doesn't work quite as well as "Son of Interflux" (or "Don't Care High", for that matter). Sean is, of course, a perfectly normal boy -- there's even a bit at the beginning of the book where his grandfather, known only as Gramps, lays out just how normal he is -- thus setting up the odd-couple dynamic that Korman uses a lot in his early books. More interesting is Gramps: missing his old neighborhood in Brooklyn and hating the suburbs (Nassau County is in Long Island), referring to everyone around him (up to and including his grandson) as a robot, and smoking terrible-smelling cigars, he has a decidedly Pinkwater-esque feel to him. There's also an unexpected bit of technophobia: Sean and Jardine's high school is plagued by an experimental power-generating system that constantly breaks down, while at home Sean's father deploys a series of equally problematic gadgets that never quite do what they're supposed to. But all this stuff, though generally very funny indeed, doesn't quite add up to a cohesive whole: much like the title metaphor, it almost gets there, but something seems a bit off. Nonetheless, it is still very funny, and Jardine is a great character: recommended, but read the other two in the trilogy first.

[Steven R. McEvoy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the 39th volume I have read from Korman’s masterful pen! About 18 months ago, in the summer of 2022, Korman published his 100th book. Yes you read that correctly, his hundredth book. My introduction to Korman’s works was the 39 Clues back in 2009. Since then I have read almost 40 of his books. With each one I read I am entertained and often challenged. My son often reads these books to me or with me. And now my youngest daughter has started reading them. I have been jumping around on different series and from his oldest works to his newest. There are so many great read in Korman’s canon.

My son and I started reading Gordon Korman books together a few years ago, when he was given one as an end of year gift by his teacher. She gave the whole class the same Scholastic edition and wrote a note to each student in their copy of the book. Prior to that I had a read a few of his contributions to the 39 Clues series and had enjoyed them. My son and I have mostly been reading his more recent titles. I have set the goal of reading all of Korman’s books.

The description of this volume is:

“Sean Delancey, high school basketball star, is just an ordinary, popular guy...until he meets eccentric Raymond Jardine, a boy with absolutely no luck. Although reluctant at first, Sean is drawn into Raymond's wacky scheme to secure a spot on the school-sponsored trip to Theamelpos, the fabulous Greek island that grants good luck to everyone who visits it.

Through his friendship with Raymond, Sean learns to value individuality and independent thinking. And in the book's hilarious climax, it is Sean himself who engineers the showdown between the student body and SACGEN, the principal's pet project, which is a virtually useless Solar/Air Current Generating Machine that supposedly powers the high school!

Smooth, skillful writing and an engaging cast of quirky characters will keep readers chuckling to the very end of this Korman classic.”

Unlike many of Korman’s books the chapters do not have titles. It is also not told in alternating first person perspectives. But that does not detract from the volume. In many ways it reminds me of Don't Care High it is at times very fun. At times a little sad. And At times very heart warming. I love the character of Raymond Jardine, he reminds me of Stephen in Braveheart who talks openly to God. “This can be him Lord, I’s prettier than this man.” Raymond is an incredible character and his approach to life and talking to God is awesome. It was also great to watch the growth and change in Sean Delancey as the story progresses. And the poetry assignment that becomes an epic adventure. Wow what a story!

This is another excellent read from the pen of Korman. It is now my favourite of the stand-alone stories. Excellent characters, hilarious plot, and some amazing events. Well done Korman well done.

[Minda Gomez · Rating 5 out of 5]

I read this book 30 years ago and my family still quotes some of the poems written by "Gavin Gunhold," i.e. the made-up poet created by a boy for a school assignment. This is one of Gordon Korman's lesser-known books these days, but it clearly made an impact on me as a child. I actually wrote down all of the poems in a notebook and would quote them. My family can't see an animal head mounted on a wall without quoting:

"On registration day at taxidermy school,
I distinctly saw the eyes of the stuffed moose
Move."

[Bibek · Rating 5 out of 5]

What a fun read, wow. I'm almost 40 and me and my wife were in stitches reading out this book aloud. This book must have had a hand in helping us recover from few days of flu faster, I'm sure.
And regardless of whatever age you are, if you haven't read this, please do find a copy somewhere and read it. It's really funny.

It's not too hard to fall in love with the main characters. They complement each other quite well. And the plot is just amazing, it keeps on giving. Korman made sure to build up the hype until the very end and put a very fitting ending to it all.

[Gina · Rating 4 out of 5]

There's a kind of sameness to all of Korman's buddy books, but between the poetry of Gavin Gunhold and introducing me to the word "arse" sometime in the early 90s, I have a real soft spot for this one.

[Alyssa · Rating 5 out of 5]

possibly my favorite book of all time and has been for years. published in 1987 and already portraying teenagers fed up with technology. you are more relevant and relatable than ever before sean delancey.

[David Erkale · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is funny and gets absurd after a few chapters. Especially when the adults are defending a failure of a solar energy project, it was great to read about the students putting it down and trying to prove that it can't work properly.

[Rachit Gupta · Rating 5 out of 5]

I really liked the book! Awesome plot!

[Anna · Rating 4 out of 5]

easy read! lots of fun, light, white fam in long island read.

[Beth C · Rating 4 out of 5]

Some good stuff