Breaking Point
Tripped in class, mooned in the hall, cola poured through the slats in  his locker, spitballs stuck in his hair--how much more can Paul Richmond take at  his super-snobby private school, expensive Gate-Bicknell Christian? Paul is  there free because his mom works in the guidance office, but that fact makes him  an instant outcast, his only friend a funny-looking, independent girl named  Binky. Even worse off is David Blanco, whose mom is a cafeteria lady and whose  father is the janitor. The jocks hound him unmercifully, even killing his dog.  When Paul goes to David's house to offer sympathy, David rejects him angrily,  saying "You'll be next." Binky, too, tries to explain the cruelty of the rich  kids who surround them, but Paul yearns to be accepted anyway. So when cool,  elegant, and charismatic Charlie Good asks for his help in computer lab, Paul is  eager to comply, and later, when Charlie and his henchmen, Meat and St. John,  come for him in the night for a game of mailbox baseball, Paul willingly does  the bashing. Gradually he is accepted at school as part of Charlie's group, but  for a price: having to hack into the school computers to change Charlie's D in  biology. When David Blanco kills himself and the school simply ignores it, Paul  is momentarily taken aback, especially when he learns that David had been  Charlie's allylastyear. But then Charlie reveals hisrealplan,  for which everything else has been preliminary, and Paul has his last chance to  say no.Alex Flinn, whoseBreathing  Underwaterearned high praise, does tribute to the great Robert Cormier  in this dark and brilliant novel about the high price of acquiescence to evil.  (Ages 14 and older)--Patty Campbell--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.