Oak Hill Public Library

Petey

by Ben Mikaelson

School Library Journal Gr 7 Up-This ambitious book succeeds on a number of levels. It is based on a true, tragic situation in which Petey, born with cerebral palsy in 1920, is misdiagnosed as mentally retarded. Unable to care for him at home, his parents relinquish him to the care of the state, where he languishes in a mental institution for the next five decades. Step by institutional step, readers see how this tragedy could happen. More importantly, readers feel Petey's pain, boredom, hope, fear, and occasional joy. A handful of people grow to know and love him over the course of his long and mostly difficult life, but few are able to effect much change. In 1977, statewide reorganization and a new, correct diagnosis result in Petey being moved to a local nursing home. There, the final, triumphant chapters of his life are entwined with an eighth-grade student named Trevor, who finds his own life transformed by love and caring in ways he never could have imagined. Mikaelsen successfully conveys Petey's strangled attempts to communicate. He captures the slow passage of time, the historical landscape encompassed. He brings emotions to the surface and tears to readers' eyes as time and again Petey suffers the loss of friends he has grown to love. Yet, this book is much more than a tearjerker. Its messages-that all people deserve respect; that one person can make a difference; that changing times require new attitudes-transcend simplistic labels. Give this book to anyone who has ever shouted "retard" at another. Give it to any student who "has" to do community service. Give it to anyone who needs a good book to read.-Joel Shoemaker, Southeast Jr. High School, Iowa City, IA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

School Library Journal Gr 7-12-Actor L.J. Ganser provides a superb narration of Ben Mikaelsen's touching story (Hyperion, 1998) about a man who lives his entire life institutionalized because of cerebral palsy, yet manages to maintain and share a real love of life. The story begins in 1922, when the infant Petey is delivered to the Warm Springs Insane Asylum in Montana by parents who are unable to cope with his disabilities. He is misdiagnosed as an "idiot," and thought to be completely incapable of learning or comprehension. Petey grows up in Warm Springs, often in misery, but finds occasional moments of joy in the wind on his face, birds outside the window, a family of mice and, eventually, other people. Another young inmate, Calvin, is about Petey's age and is mildly retarded, but he helps Petey find a voice and becomes a true friend. The second half of the book takes place in a nursing home in Bozeman, MT, where Petey has been moved after a major reorganization of the state hospital system. There Petey is befriended by an eighth-grader who grows to love Petey and adopts him as his grandfather. Ganser does a good job of creating distinct voices for the characters, particularly Petey, who speaks only in a few guttural phrases. Also included is an interview with the author who discusses his relationship with Clyde Cothern, the real-life inspiration for the book, and suggests ways that young people can make a difference in the lives of older people by visiting nursing homes. Petey was a 1999 Best Book for Young Adults and has been nominated for children's choice awards in several states. This recording will win new fans for Petey and for Mikaelsen.-Sarah Flowers, Santa Clara County Library, Morgan Hill, CA (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.

Kirkus Born in 1920 with cerebral palsy and dismissed by ignorant doctors as feeble-minded, Petey Corbin spends all but the first two years of his long life institutionalized, his world barely larger than the walls of an asylum ward or, much later, nursing home. Within those walls, further imprisoned in an uncontrollable, atrophied body, he nonetheless experiences joy and love, sorrow, loss, and triumph as intensely as anyone on the outside. Able to communicate only with rudimentary sounds and facial expressions, he makes a series of friends through the years; as a very old man in a 1990s setting, he comes into contact with Trevor, a teenager who defends the old man against a trio of bullies, and remains a loyal companion through his final illness. This is actually two books in one, as with a midstream switch in point-of-view as the story becomes Trevor's, focusing on his inner growth as he overcomes his initial disgust to become Petey's friend. Mikaelsen portrays the places in which Petey is kept in (somewhat) less horrific terms than Kate Seago did in Matthew Unstrung (1998), and surrounds him with good-hearted people (even Petey's parents are drawn sympathetically--they are plunged into poverty during his first two years by the bills his care entails). There are no accusations here, and despite some overly sentimentalized passages, the message comes through that every being deserves care, respect, and a chance to make a difference. Copyright �Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.

Publishers Weekly A writer admired for fast-paced adventure stories like Stranded and Sparrow Hawk Red takes on a more serious topic in this novel about the relationship between a teenager and a man mistakenly institutionalized for much of his life. Part one of the novel relates Petey's "backstory": in 1922, at the age of two, his distraught parents commit him to the state's insane asylum, unaware that their son is actually suffering from severe cerebral palsy. Petey avoids withdrawal and depression despite the horrific conditions in his new "home" and, over the course of 60 years, a string of caretakers befriends but then leaves him. The point of view in part two shifts from Petey to Trevor, an eighth-grader suffering from both lack of friends and lack of parental attention after a series of moves. Trevor finds the answer to his needs in an unlikely friendship with the 70-year-old Petey, who has moved to a nursing home. Mikaelson capably highlights the abuses and prejudices suffered by those stricken with cerebral palsy, but teeters dangerously over the line between poignancy and sentimentality. At its best, the third-person narration makes readers privy to the thoughts of the two protagonists, but more often it keeps them at bay ("As people escaped civilization to enjoy the solitude of a mountain peak, so also did many of the patients' minds escape existence and find solitude beyond the reaches of the ward"). As a result, the characters never really come to life beyond their roles as symbols�Petey that of the power of the human spirit, Trevor that of the tolerant, unprejudiced do-gooder. A novel that never meets the promise of its compelling premise. Ages 10-up. (Sept.) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved

Book list Gr. 7^-10. There are really two stories here: in the first, a little boy named Petey, born in 1905 with cerebral palsy, is misdiagnosed as an idiot, and his parents reluctantly institutionalize him. Even though he cannot make himself understood easily, he becomes attached to caregivers and another inmate. He grows up with a sharp intelligence and a desire for human things: affection, touch, the feel of the outside air. He is moved to another institution as an old man (the story leaps decades between some chapters) and loses touch with all those he cared about. In the second half, a young teen named Trevor, almost against his will, befriends Petey when he saves Petey from a snowball attack by local riffraff in Bozeman, Montana. Trevor engineers Petey's reunion with an old buddy, gets him a new wheelchair, and, in a four-hanky climax, calls him Grandpa and inspires his distant and estranged parents. Although Petey is a cross between angel and saint, and none of the characters is any more than two-dimensional, there's a real strength here in the depiction of the person inside a disability and the dignity that is a divine right, even for the old or feeble. --GraceAnne A. DeCandido

From Booklist, Copyright � American Library Association. Used with permission.

Kirkus Born in 1920 with cerebral palsy and dismissed by ignorant doctors as feeble-minded, Petey Corbin spends all but the first two years of his long life institutionalized, his world barely larger than the walls of an asylum ward or, much later, nursing home. Within those walls, further imprisoned in an uncontrollable, atrophied body, he nonetheless experiences joy and love, sorrow, loss, and triumph as intensely as anyone on the outside. Able to communicate only with rudimentary sounds and facial expressions, he makes a series of friends through the years; as a very old man in a 1990s setting, he comes into contact with Trevor, a teenager who defends the old man against a trio of bullies, and remains a loyal companion through his final illness. This is actually two books in one, as with a midstream switch in point-of-view as the story becomes Trevor's, focusing on his inner growth as he overcomes his initial disgust to become Petey's friend. Mikaelsen portrays the places in which Petey is kept in (somewhat) less horrific terms than Kate Seago did in Matthew Unstrung (1998), and surrounds him with good-hearted people (even Petey's parents are drawn sympathetically?they are plunged into poverty during his first two years by the bills his care entails). There are no accusations here, and despite some overly sentimentalized passages, the message comes through that every being deserves care, respect, and a chance to make a difference. (Fiction. 11-13)

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