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what would be most beneficial to the book to change about the book

I love this book, so it's very hard to choose something to change!

I would say the only thing would be to have the main character have to "suffer" a bit more at his new high school. When he gets there he stands up to one bully one time and then suddenly has gained the respect of the entire school. In addition to this he is a star athlete and his girlfriend is one of the most beautiful and popular girls in the school!

It almost seems to easy for him, which may be a bit unrealistic. Then again, I love that quality of the book because it shows that sometimes our fears are unfounded!  I'd still like those things to all happen to him, but maybe see him go through a bit more hardship than what he actually does.

I thought that part of the book (Poster #2 refers to it) was very contrived and not too realistic.  Almost Hollywood novelish in a way.

I agree that Juniors experience at Reardon is almost unrealistic. After the first few days Junior barely faces any issues. I would have thought that he would have had a much harder time in a school where he is the only Indian. The other thing that I did not like about the book was that emotions often crossed over into completely different emotions. For example when Junior finds out about his sisters death he goes into fits of laughter. I did not like this aspect of the book at all. I thought it was completely unrealistic and did not add to the book whatsoever.