The Big Blueberry Barf-Off – R.L. Stine

What?! I was in Florida, had read all of MY books while sitting in the airport, and I had brought this one for Madison.

It was cute. It was what I remembered from R.L. Stine, but felt very “Sideways Stories from a Wayside School.” Whenever I read a kid’s book, I try to think about how I would have liked it had I been a kid. Would I have recognized the obvious caricatures? Who would be my favorite character? Which words would I have stumbled over?

I loved this book description so much, I am posting Matthew Feliciano’s (age 8 ) from Amazon.com:

“Rotten School: The Big Blueberry Barf-Off” is about a kid named Bernie Bridges. He goes to Rotten School and he rules the school. He convinces the teachers and workers to do all sorts of things. He even convinced the school chef that Milky Way bars are a vegetable. The only person he can’t rule is Sherman Oaks. Sherman has one thing that Bernie wants: a super cool watch that has 42 functions on it including telling time and making popcorn.

Bernie challenges Sherman to a pie-eating contest. If Sherman wins, Bernie has to carry him to classes on his back. If Bernie wins, Sherman gives him his watch. Bernie has a plan to win. He puts Beast in the contest. Beast eats lots and lots of things so he should be able to win with no problem. Before the contest, Sherman bet Beast that he could eat 50 hamburgers. Beast won the bet by eating 54 burgers but now he was too full for the pie eating contest. So Bernie said that he would buy Beast two Snickers bars if he ate the pie. (Beast loved Snickers bars). The contest was still on.

Beast won the contest but then they got caught by Ms. Monella. She walked in and asked who was responsible. Sherman put all the blame on Bernie. As Ms. Monella was yelling at Bernie, everybody started barfing up the blueberry pie. They all got in trouble for eating the pies and had to clean up the classroom.