The Losers Club has a simple plot, which leads straight to the climactic ending. Author Andrew Clements, known for his "school stories", stays true to the genre in this book, without going off the rails with some ridiculous character scheme.
 | From the author's website: Alec can’t put a good book down. So when Principal Vance lays down the law—pay attention in class, or else—Alec takes action. He can’t lose all his reading time, so he starts a club. A club he intends to be the only member of. After all, reading isn’t a team sport, and no one would want to join something called the Losers Club, right? But as more and more kids find their way to Alec’s club—including his ex-friend turned bully and the girl Alec is maybe starting to like—Alec notices something. Real life might be messier than his favorite books, but it’s just as interesting. It was an interesting read, and I enjoyed the journey Alec took me on, but there was a lack of depth along the way. I wanted to be able to cheer for main character Alec more as he did battle with a classmate who stayed on the verge of bullying for most of the time, but there was never a time to really do so. |
In fact, I am torn between wanting to cheer and being surprised by the way in which Alec was able to keep the peace with every single character in the story. While I like that he demonstrated proper behaviors in dealing with antagonists.
