Other books to stir the reluctant reader. Funny, also boarding school, read by boys and girls (even though its a boys' school) - the Jennings series by Anthony Buckeridge. Recently the publishers said they were taking them out of print, but, you lucky people who have never seen them before, they are to be released in the States in three weeks time. The first one is called "Jennings goes to School." Here's a sample:From "Jennings Goes to School" by Anthony Buckeridge.
Mr. Carter saw in front of him a small boy not unlike the dozens of other small boys who were lined up outside his room. His suit, socks and tie conformed exactly to the regulation pattern. His dark brown hair, which still bore the faintest trace of a parting, was no different from that of his fellows, and his face was the average sort of face worn by boys of his generation. So Mr. Carter learned little from this first meeting. Later on, he was to learn a lot. "A new boy, eh?" said Mr. Carter. "And what's your name?" "Jennings, sir." "Oh yes, here you are on the list. J.C.T. Jennings; ten years, two months. Right?" "No sir, not quite right, sir; ten years, two months and three days last Tuesday, sir." "We won't worry about that," said Mr. Carter. He had placed the new boy by now. Only that morning the Headmaster had shown him a letter from a Mr. Jennings, expressing doubts lest his son, who had never been away from home before, should not settle down at boarding school. Mr. Carter gave him another look; he seemed the sort of boy who knew how to look after himself.
And another:
"Oh, and there's another thing, Jennings," said Venables amidst splashes, "you have to wash your feet every night unless it's your bath night." He grabbed his tooth paste and squeezed hard. "Oh, golly!" he said. "This is ozard muck. Look, I've squeezed out about a yard and a half. What'll I do with it? I can't put it back." "You could write your name round the basin like they do with icing sugar," said Jennings, who had arrived to occupy the remaining basin. "Have you got enough to write 'many happy returns of the day'?" "Haven't got time," replied Venables," though it'd be quite a prang if we'd thought of it earlier." He took a mouthful from his tooth glass and gargled. "I say, Atki," he said, "can you change gear when you gargle? Like this, look ---- I mean, listen." He gargled again, starting on a low note and rising up the scale with forcible vocal contortions to show where the gears changed from low to second, from second to top. The car gathered speed, and, as an artistic finale, faded into the distance. "Super duper!" said Jennings. "Smash-on prang!" agreed Atkinson. "Yes, it's not bad, is it?" admitted Venables. "I've been practising quite a lot in the hols." "All the same, I can do it just as well," said Jennings. "So can I," said Atkinson. The dormitory hummed with cars changing gear; light sports cars with super-charged engines and heavy lorries stalling on steep hills. Atkinson swallowed his gargle while changing down to take a hairpin bend, at eighty miles an hour, and had to be slapped on the back by his fellow motorists. "I know something better than that," said Jennings. "I can be a super-jet fighter; listen.... Eee-ow-ow; eee-ow-ow; eee-ow-ow.....Dacka-dacka; dacka-dacka..." his machine gun spat venomously. "Eee-ow-ow; eee-ow-ow; eee-ow-ow....Doyng!" "What's the 'doyng'?" inquired Venables. "That's the other plane crashing after I've hit him," said the aeronaut. "I'm going into a dive, now. Eee-ow-ow; eee-ow-ow....Dacka-dacka; dacka-dacka...." The Squadron's personnel was at once joined by Venables, Atkinson and Temple in Spitfires, and all four eee'd and ow'd and dacka-dacka'd and doynged with outstretched arms, wheeling, banking and diving, while Darbishire sat on his bed and put his fingers in his ears. The door opened and the noise stopped abruptly. "H'm," said Mr. Carter from the doorway. "If dorm No.4 Fighter Squadron doesn't make a forced landing and get back to base, there'll be trouble; this light's going out in three minutes." "Yes, sir," murmured the Fighter Squadron meekly.
There is a period sense to the early books - a lot of RAF slang, for example. These aren't the best bits of comic writing (Buckeridge has been compared to Wodehouse _ I can't remember by whom) - I happen to have them on my computer because I used them as texts for teaching. And this is a link to Buckeridge on Rowling.
Penny