The Dark Days of Hamburger Halpin

January 18, 2010
New student Will Halpin is overweight and deaf, and he adeptly eavesdrops on conversations by lip-reading while his own inner monologue is off and running. Debut author Berk injects Will's narrative voice with humor, irreverence, and self-deprecation; readers are also privy to Will's occasional horny thoughts about girls, which are funny and genuine without being overly vulgar (“The first thing I notice is this: public school girls are freaking hot
. Nice
. I try to focus on that and not on the sinking feeling that it might be way harder not to fail here than I thought”). Midway through, the story really takes off: after a football player takes a spill down a mineshaft on a field trip, Will and his new friend Devon try to solve the mystery of the student's death. Investigations into sleazy teachers and liked (and not-so-well-liked) classmates ensue. Much of the book's second half takes place in IMs between Will and Devon, which push the story forward at a lively pace. An engrossing whodunit that subtly draws attention to social issues surrounding deafness. Ages 12–up.

Starred review from January 1, 2010
Gr 8 Up-Will Halpin has ditched his former "deaf school" and is now trying to merge into the auditory-able mainstream at Carbon High in eastern Pennsylvania. As the new, overweight kid who has to sit off to the side during classes so he can try to read the lips of both his teachers and his classmates, Willno slouch when it comes to reading human reactionsquickly downsizes his social expectations and retreats back into the soundless cocoon of his own skull. Luckily for readers, it's darkly hilarious in there. That's this debut novel's most potent hook: the opportunity to spend some quality time inside the precociously perceptive and sardonically witty head of this ultimate outsider as he visually eavesdropsand rips onthe sick subtleties of a typical high school's social order. What teens wouldn't want to have Will's skills as he, notebook in hand, monitors the school bus mirror and pieces together what all the cool kids are talking about? Most, Will discovers, as he deftly dissects personalities and devilishly deconstructs high school culture, are slavishly focused on being invited to an exclusive party being thrown by popular jock Pat. But when Pat dies during a field trip to a defunct coal mine, under suspicious circumstances, the story morphs into an engaging mystery as Will reluctantly accepts the unsettlingly friendly overtures of a quirky classmate bent on enlisting him as a partner in some amateur sleuthing. A coming-of-age mash-up of satire, realistic fiction, mystery, and ill-fated teen romance, "The Dark Days of Hamburger Halpin" is a genre-bending breakthrough that teens are going to love."Jeffrey Hastings, Highlander Way Middle School, Howell, MI"

Copyright 2010 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

December 15, 2009
Grades 6-9 Will Halpin is the new kid at school. This is a tough situation even in the best of circumstances, but Will is also deaf, and his self-image isnt great (he compares his body to a sedentary manatee). Having left a school for the deaf, Will survives at his first public school with a lot of lip-reading, texting, and the friendship of another social outcast, Devon Smiley. Together, the two students become a duo of misfit Hardy Boys who investigate the death of a classmate while on a field trip to the Happy Memory Coal Mine. The mystery is not the strong suit here; its the goofiness of these two unexpected heroes and their take on high school that carries the novel. The school bus, for instance, has a directly rising slope of coolness from the front . . . to the back. . . . If you keep going, youd fly out the back . . . and land in the cars belonging to the kids far too cool to ever set foot on a bus. A humorous first novel from an author to watch.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)

July 1, 2010
Will Halpin recognizes that being deaf and overweight places him well beyond the edges of most social circles. Even so, when the school's star quarterback "accidentally" falls down a mine shaft, Will and his odd-squad of fellow outcasts solve the mystery and gain newfound regard. Will's frank, self-deprecating sense of humor keeps the story from getting too dark.

(Copyright 2010 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)