I CLOSE MY EYES. RIGHT. WHEN I OPEN THEM AGAIN, THE PERSON STARING BACK AT ME FROM THIS MIRROR WILL BE ME. PLEASE, PLEASE , MAKE IT BE ME!After a terrible accident, Gus can't believe he's survived. But has he? He's woken up in the body of an old man and his real body is unconscious in intensive care. Now he's got a seventy-year-old wife, really bad taste in clothes, and everyone thinks he's crazy.Gus lives and breathes basketball, but could he actually be playing for his life this time?Will he ever be fourteen again?A FUNNY, FAST-PACED FANTASY FROM THE AUTHOR OF THE BESTSELLING SPECKY MAGEE SERIES.
Popular and prolific Australian children’s author Felice Arena is the creator of many best-selling and award-winning children's books for all ages. Some of these include the acclaimed middle-grade historical novels The Boy and the Spy, Fearless Frederic, A Great Escape, and The Unstoppable Flying Flanagan – the bestselling Specky Magee series, the junior series' Sporty Kids and The Besties, and the joyous read-aloud picture books Pasta!, Cheese! and most recently My Big Secret - also illustrated by Arena. www.felicearena.comInstagram.com/felicearenabooks
1: I think that “Whipper Snapper” looks like a great book to read because the main character swaps bodies with a 70 year male. This books include sports which is my favourite activity and a confusing plot that’s so crazy it just might work. This book incorporates basketball as what I think is the main point into getting the body swap back. Gus is the main character and it says on the blurb that he is playing for his life. My guess is that he will play against his fourteen year old self and has to beat him to get his body back.
2: I am currently on page 100 of “whippersnapper” and I would have to rate this as an amazing book. I had to force myself to stop and write this because I was enjoying this so much. In the storyline the Pennsburry High basketball had just made it to the finals and Gus is in a coma. Gus’s soul is in George Cavendish’s body that is a 70 year old man. Gus has all of his memories and people still assume that he is George but has no memory of what George is like. Gus is now in a dilemma of how exactly he gets his body back. There are a few options including talking to Coach Andersons widow who believes that she can talk to the dead. I love the storyline and I am wondering if Gus can get his body back. For the storyline what I want to happen is that Gus’s body wakes up and now George and Gus need to switch back there body’s to get everything back to normal. I love Gus in the story as George because everybody thinks that he is crazy because of all his sudden changes such as the fact that he knew nothing about his earlier life
3.I loved this book I found it to meet all of my expectations and more I would have to rate this book overall at 10/10. I would recommend this book for the sole reason that the storyline is interesting and the fact that the way the book ended almost made you tear up. In the end the body swap finally occurs because Gus wins the championship and both him and George pass out leading to a final body swap. During this final body swap George asks for one final request and that is to recite a poem to Doris. The poem is ladled “My Dream Girl” and when Gus was George he was contemplating about the girl that he thought was the “Girl of his Dreams.” When the final body swap happened Gus woke up next the Annie the real girl of his dreams and they instantly fell in love. They took a long walk and they pasted George old house and Gus recites the poem that George wanted. This is not the best time on the review to say it but George did die and this was his final request. The book ends with the poem and Doris tearing up and the last sentence is “It’s good to be me” meaning that he was happy to be back in his real body and didn’t take anything for granted.
A little bit similar to Meg Cabot's "Airhead" in premise, but for a different audience. The switch of an old man and a 14 yo boy is even funnier, and Arena manages to paint some convincing interactions between family members and between friends. Personally, I skipped some of the descriptions of basketball game play, but I know these will be part of the appeal for many others. Will enthusiastically promote it to our Y7 group.
14 year old Gus Delfino - self-proclaimed basketball legend - suffers an accident where he is flipped into an elderly man's body. The final transaction of body-swapping occurs in an exciting school basketball final of Pennsbury vs. Winston High schools, where old scores are settled.