Stephan Pastis is best known as the creator of Pearls Before Swine, a daily comic that's been in papers since 2001. In 2013, Candlewick Press published his first middle grade novel featuring a character entirely separate from that world (although, truth be told, Timmy would not be entirely out of place there. Nor would Total.). Meet Timmy Failure in his first adventure: Mistakes Were Made.
Timmy is a high-energy, low-intellect kid with a polar bear for a best friend and a nemesis (She Who Will Not Be Named (Corrina Corrina)) for the record books. He is adjusting to living with his mother in a new apartment. She works a lot and he has decided to help make money by starting a detective agency with his pet polar bear, Total. The agency is called Total Failure, Inc. Total eats most of the profits. Most of the costs, too.
There are now five books in the series, and Timmy shows no sign of suddenly getting it right. Thankfully.
One of my co-workers handed me the galley for this book in late summer of 2012, not long before we hosted Stephan Pastis on book tour for a Pearls Before Swine collection. (pro-tip: If you get the chance, go see him when he goes on book tour. The man can tell a story. Get there early. Plan to stand in line if you want the book signed. It will take a while. It will be worth it.). I managed to not drool my love for this book all over him. Not by much. We were slightly understaffed. That helped.
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| This kid. Seriously. |
Timmy is kind of an idiot. He is young, his world has just flipped itself, his polar bear is a garbage disposal who messes up everything, and he has to deal with all sorts of people around him who make no sense to the poor boy. He decides to add order to things by solving mysteries. He is not always amazing at solving mysteries. Or at accepting the consequences when his "solutions" are not exactly on the mark.
Normally, I would run as fast as possible away from this character, but Pastis gives him depth, sweetness and a naivete that resonate throughout his shenanigans. This was the first middle grade book that I'd connected with for 6 years, and with it came a whole library of books. The best books for middle grade readers are the ones that get that kids see the horrible in the world and know they will have to deal with it someday. Not today. Not yet. Soon enough. They know they have to be ready for it, and that lends a weight to the journeys of these characters that when done well makes these narratives almost fly off the page.
Timmy is living with his mom who has to work too hard and gets too little support from anyone else. He doesn't know what's happened, really, and he doesn't know how to help her. But help is needed and questions have to be answered, so start a detective agency. I have no idea what Pastis thought he was doing when he wrote these books, but I find in them laughter in the face of the weight of one kid's world that otherwise might be too much.
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