Review by New York Times Review
GARY PAULSEN'S novel "Lawn Boy" is a Horatio Alger story for the hedge fund era. Not nearly as earnest as the Alger books, and a lot more fun to read, it's about a 12-year-old Minnesota boy who in the course of a summer earns half a million dollars without really doing a whole lot. Paulsen's unnamed narrator has two non-Horatian advantages: a stockbroker and a piece of heavy equipment. Or sort of heavy; it's an old riding mower given to him by his grandmother as a 12th-birthday present. Though not in the least mechanical-minded, he feels an instant bond with the machine, and almost as soon as he fires it up a neighbor comes by offering to pay 20 bucks for a mowing job. The local lawn care guy, it turns out, has just run off with the wife of a customer, and presumably because he poses less of a sexual threat, Lawn Boy, as we might as well call him, soon has more work than he can handle. So he expands, hiring some undocumented workers, and also invests his profits in the market, starting with some shares in a coffin company. Lawn Boy is guided in all these endeavors by a local day trader named Arnold Howell, who takes it upon himself to initiate the boy into the mysteries and beauties of capitalism. (The chapter titles all sound like an economics textbook: "Capital Growth Coupled With the Principles of Production Expansion," "Economic Expansion Combined With Portfolio Diversification," and the like.) Arnold, who has a bowl-job haircut, wears '70s clothing and says "groovy" a lot, is the sort of character who makes an adult reader worry he might be a child molester. But his agenda is apparently benign, and his gift for picking stocks is so good you wonder why he's stuck in Eden Prairie, Minn., instead of on the floor at Bear Stearns. To diversify, he also gets Lawn Boy to invest in a kindly but possibly overconcussed prizefighter named Joseph Powdermilk Jr., aka Joey Pow, who comes in handy when a bad guy called Rock tries to muscle in on the lawn business. All this would be much harder to take were it not for the book's appealing style of narration. Lawn Boy is quick to admit that he is a kid with an "average brain and average grades," and he relates his successes with wonderment. Except perhaps for not being quite gross enough, Paulsen has mastered the very hard trick of sounding exactly like a 12-year-old without being either cute or condescending. Far from bragging about his newfound wealth, moreover, Lawn Boy is a little embarrassed by it, not wanting to show up his hard-working parents. (Mom teaches in an experimental school, and Dad is a not-very-successful inventor.) Unusual for books of this sort, which combine enterprise with what is essentially a summer idyll in the way of, say, Robert McCloskey's Homer Price stories or Beverly Cleary's "Henry and the Paper Route," Lawn Boy has no friends, no extra-business adventures and not a clue about what to do with his money. But unlike Arnold, he will probably wind up at a fund like Citadel or Cerberus and amass so much dough that he can endow an entire lawnmower museum. Charles McGrath, a former editor of the Book Review, is a writer at large for The Times.
Copyright (c) The New York Times Company [October 27, 2009]
Review by Booklist Review
This short and hilarious tale pitches an ordinary preteen with an old riding lawn mower into a dizzying ascent up the financial ladder. His sights set no higher than a new inner tube for his bike, the young narrator is thrilled to make $60 in one day, mowing his neighbors' lawns. Just as demand for his services skyrockets, he meets Arnold, an honest, home-based stockbroker who becomes his business manager . . and less than a month later, the lad has a dozen migrant laborers in his employ. The legality of these workers is left vague, but their young employer treats them fairly, and the thousands of dollars he earns goes into some wildly successful investments--including sponsorship of a rising prizefighter whose help comes in handy when the burgeoning enterprise attracts a shakedown artist. Thanks to quick lessons in, to quote some of the chapter heads, Capital Growth Coupled with the Principles of Product Expansion and Force of Arms and Its Application to Business, the young tycoon ends up smarter than when he started out, and worth half a million dollars. When it comes to telling funny stories about boys, no one surpasses Paulsen, and here he is in top form. --John Peters Copyright 2007 Booklist
From Booklist, Copyright (c) American Library Association. Used with permission.
Review by Publisher's Weekly Review
At the start of this witty, quick-moving tale from the Newbery author, a 12-year-old receives an unexpected birthday present from his grandmother: his late grandfather's riding lawn mower. Since his family's lawn is postage-stamp size with grass that "never seemed to grow enough to need mowing," he's initially unsure what to do with the machine. But he soon realizes that he can earn money mowing neighbors' lawns-perhaps even enough to buy a new inner tube for his bike. As the young entrepreneur's lawn-mowing business booms, he sees green in more ways than one, making enough money to buy countless inner tubes and learning a lesson about capitalism and investing. His teacher, a colorful ex-hippie named Arnold, is a down-on-his-luck stockbroker who brokers a barter deal with the lad, offering to invest his earnings for him in exchange for grass-cutting services. Repeatedly remarking how "groovy" Lawn Boy's success is, Arnold instructs his young pal in the rules of the business road, humorously reflected in Paulsen's chapter titles (such as "Capital Growth Coupled with the Principles of Production Expansion" and "Conflict Resolution and Its Effects on Economic Policy"). Adding further wry dimension to the plot are a tough-talking thug who threatens to take over the kid's business, the prize fighter whom Arnold (through another investment) arranges for Lawn Boy to sponsor, and the boy's delightfully-and deceptively-dotty grandmother, who gets the novel's sage last line: "You know, dear, Grandpa always said, take care of your tools and they'll take care of you." Readers will find this madcap story a wise investment of their time. Ages 10-up. (June) (c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
(c) Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved
Review by School Library Journal Review
Gr 4-7-Learning the workings of the free-market economy has never been more fun than in this tall tale of entrepreneurship set in Eden Prairie, MN. When the narrator's grandmother gives him an old rider mower for his 12th birthday, his life changes; he senses "some kind of force behind it." Almost as soon as he figures out how to run it, the boy is in business-by the second day he has eight jobs. When he mows the lawn of Arnold Howell, an aging hippie e-trader, the cash-poor man offers a stock-market account in lieu of payment. Arnold not only invests the money; he also offers business advice. Soon lawn boy has a partner, 15 employees, a lot of money invested in the market, and a prizefighter. Chapter headings suggest business principles behind what is happening. Throughout the tale, the narrator is innocent of his success as he rises early each morning to begin each job, eats lunch on the mower, and longs for a less-hectic summer vacation. This rags-to-riches success story has colorful characters, a villain, and enough tongue-in-cheek humor to make it an enjoyable selection for the whole family.-Kathryn Kosiorek, Cuyahoga County Public Library, Brooklyn, OH (c) Copyright 2010. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
(c) Copyright Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Horn Book Review
(Intermediate) There are few twelve-year-old boys who get a lawnmower for their birthday, and probably fewer still who keep up with the stock market, but Paulsen presents just such a character, appealingly gift-wrapped in an original, humorous tale. When the narrator's ditzy grandmother gives him his grandfather's old riding mower for his twelfth birthday, the youngster feels a kinship with the machine and decides that, since he has little to do over the summer, he might as well earn a few bucks mowing lawns. Then he meets Arnold, an investor with a cash-flow problem, who promises to buy stocks for him as payment for a freshly trimmed yard. The business grows; Arnold advises the fledgling capitalist to outsource many of his services, all the while hedging against inflation with more and more investments. These then double, triple, and quadruple and expand to more bizarre ventures, including shares in a prizefighter, Joey Pow. With all the energy of a bull market and a farce that grows as steadily as crabgrass, this brief novel mows down weightier tomes on required reading lists and has summer escapism written all over it. (c) Copyright 2010. The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. All rights reserved.
(c) Copyright The Horn Book, Inc., a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Review by Kirkus Book Review
After his grandmother gives him an old riding lawnmower for his summer birthday, this comedy's 12-year-old narrator putt-putts into a series of increasingly complex and economically advantageous adventures. As each lawn job begets another, one client--persuasive day-trader Arnold Howell--barters market investing and dubious local business connections. Our na™ve entrepreneur thus unwittingly acquires stock in an Internet start-up and a coffin company; a capable landscaping staff of 15 and the sponsorship of a hulking boxer named Joseph Powdermilk. There's a semi-climactic scuffle with some bad guys bent on appropriating the lawn business, but Joey Pow easily dispatches them. If there's tension here, it derives from the unremitting good news: While the reader may worry that Arnold's a rip-off artist, Joey Pow will blow his fight, or (at the very least) the parents will go ballistic once clued in--all ends refreshingly well. The most complicated parts of this breezy affair are the chapter titles, which seem lifted from an officious, tenure-track academician's economics text. Capital! (Fiction. 9-12) Copyright ©Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
Copyright (c) Kirkus Reviews, used with permission.
