School Library Journal

Gr 4-6-Donald Zinkoff is a kid everyone will recognize-the one with the stupid laugh who cracks up over nothing, the klutz who trips over his own feet, the overly exuberant student who always raises his hand but never has the right answers. Following him from first grade to middle school, the story is not so much about how the boy changes, but rather how his classmates' perceptions of him evolve over the years. In first and second grades, his eccentricities and lack of coordination are accepted, but in third grade Zinkoff is "discovered." His classmates turn their critical eyes to him and brand him a loser. From then on, he endures the fate of so many outcasts-the last to be picked for the team, a favorite prey of bullies, and the butt of cruel comments from classmates. Despite his clumsiness and occasionally poor social skills, Zinkoff is a caring, sensitive boy with loving and supportive parents. He is remarkably good-natured about all the ostracizing and taunting, but his response is genuine. It is not na vet or obliviousness that gives Zinkoff his resilient spirit-he's a kid too busy being himself to worry about what other people think of him. Although perhaps not as funny as Jack Gantos's little hellion, Joey Pigza, Zinkoff is a flawed but tough kid with an unshakable optimism that readers will find endearing. "Losers" in schools everywhere will find great comfort in this story, and the kids who would so casually brand their classmates should read it, too.-Edward Sullivan, White Pine School, TN Copyright 2002 Cahners Business Information.

ALA Booklist

Poor Donald Zinkoff. What a loser--messy, clumsy, slow. And he's giggly--an all-purpose laugher, whether it's appropriate or not. Poor kid! He can't win for losing. And everybody knows it. Everybody except Donald, that is. As his second-grade teacher wrote on the back of his report card, Donald is one happy child! And he certainly does love school! Donald, it seems, loves everything; he's a sunshine bottle. Using a present-tense, omniscient narrative voice, Spinelli charts Donald's star-crossed course--from his troubled first day of school to an act of heroism that arguably earns him acceptance in sixth grade. It's impossible to dislike sunny, sweet-spirited Donald, and readers will doubtless be pleased by his victory--even though many will find it hard to believe that a normal child could be so relentlessly oblivious to his environment. Ultimately, this nagging question of credibility compromises the success of an otherwise fast-paced, engaging story.

Starred Review for Publishers Weekly (Thu Apr 28 00:00:00 CDT 2022)

Spinelli (<EMPHASIS TYPE=""ITALIC"">Maniac Magee; <EMPHASIS TYPE=""ITALIC"">Stargirl) here enters the consciousness of the social pariah. Beginning with Donald Zinkoff's early days of invisibility and ignorant bliss ("Maybe it annoys you that he seems to be having even more fun than you, but it's a one-second thought and it's over," says the omniscient narrator in the opening chapter), the narrative follows the boy through his instant love for Satterfield Elementary School, then zeroes in on the turning point: "In fourth grade Zinkoff is discovered.... Big-kid eyes are picky. They notice things that the little-kid eyes never bothered with.... Twenty-seven classmates now turn their new big-kid eyes to Zinkoff." On field day in June, the fourth graders call him as they see him: "Each pronounces it perfectly. 'Loser.' " Through the use of the omniscient narrator, Spinelli builds up to the boy's "unveiling" with examples of Zinkoff's uncontrollable giggling in first grade, his one-sided friendship with his next-door neighbor, and his forced poor-sport behavior on the soccer field when the hero's team does not win. Spinelli balances Zinkoff's mistreatment by his peers with abundant love from his family and the friendship of the quirky neighbors to whom his postman father delivers mail—especially the Waiting Man who patiently anticipates his brother's return from Vietnam, and a toddler attached to a clothesline with a leash. Spinelli creates no idealistic ending here; instead, with a near tragedy, the author demonstrates the differences between those who can continue to see with the more compassionate "little-kid eyes" and those who lose sight of what is truly important. Ages 8-12. <EMPHASIS TYPE=""ITALIC"">(May)

Horn Book

The present-tense, omniscient narrative shows how an exuberantly eccentric boy can suddenly be labeled a loser by judgmental fourth-grade classmates. Donald Zinkoff, the latest of Spinelli's larger-than-life protagonists, is featured in a novel that's elemental in focus yet mythic in tone. Though the story sometimes lacks subtlety, it's a wonderful character study of a likable--even lovable--kid.

Publishers Weekly (Fri Oct 04 00:00:00 CDT 2024)

<EMPHASIS TYPE=""ITALIC"">PW wrote in a starred review of this novel that begins with a boy's early days of invisibility and ignorant bliss, to the turning point when he is dubbed a loser, "The author demonstrates the difference between those who can see with compassionate 'little-kid eyes' and those who lose sight of what is truly important." Ages 10-12 <EMPHASIS TYPE=""ITALIC"">(Oct.)

Kirkus Reviews

Meet Joey Pigza's soulmate. Donald Zinkoff can't sit still, can't stop laughing, falls over his own feet, adores school and silly words and his family, is prone to throwing up due to a defective stomach valve, is impervious to peer pressure, and never frets about being perennially last in any competition just as he's last in the alphabet. Charging joyously into each day, Zinkoff baffles older kids by not responding properly to playground bullying or scorn, baffles teachers by combining eagerness to learn with an inability to produce anything but sloppy, mediocre work, and even throws his canny, loving parents for a loop sometimes. So he's a born loser, right? Not in a Spinelli novel. Readers who pay attention will come to understand after watching Zinkoff face an aggressive fourth grader on his first day of school, give up his first (and probably his last) sports trophy to console a classmate who had been on the losing team, and very nearly freeze to death on a misguided search for a missing child. Following Zinkoff from his very first foray into the front yard to middle-school sixth grade, the author of Crash (1996) and Stargirl (2000) once again provides such a steady look at a marginalized child that readers will see past limiting social categories or awkward outsides to the complex mix of past, present, and promise at the core of every individual. A masterful character portrait; here's one loser who will win plenty of hearts. (Fiction. 9-11)