We will now take a brief break from our story for a little field trip to the Cynical Young Adult Male Protagonists Hall of Fame. Here in these hallowed halls, we pay tribute to the many teenage boy...

At some point or another, every teenager thinks his or her mom is a little nuts. Let's put it this way: Your mom has been nuts, but for your sake, we hope she's never been "drunk while wearing sexy...

Beth has been through a long line of boyfriends since Karl's dad died, but based on where we leave the Shoemaker family at the end of this book, Bill just might be the one who sticks. An English pr...

Karl's former love interest in the Madmen bunch, Bonny is kind of a cross between a preppy cheerleader and a hippie chick. Really, she sounds like the kind of girl a dude like Karl in the 1970s wou...

Cheryl holds the distinction of being not only the most popular girl in the school but Queen of the Madman Underground. We're not sure how she manages to pull this feat off, but it might have somet...

Why is it that whenever a new kid shows up in young-adult novels, things get majorly shaken up? In this case, it's the arrival of the brace-faced, would-be genius Marti that begins to reform the fa...

Paul and Karl have practically been best friends since they were in the womb since both of their dads worked in politics. "We were like two pieces of the same guy," Karl says. "I got the muscles an...

One of the Madmen who serves as a supporting player in Karl's story, Squid ended up in the group because "something awful happened to him, we don't want to think about it, put him in counseling" (3...

One of Karl's numerous bosses from his five jobs, Karl helps Mr. Browning out with his upholstery business, mostly moving furniture and helping him rebuild collapsed couch frames. Not exactly the m...