JOEY PIGZA SWALLOWED THE KEY

Gantos, Jack.  Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key.  New York:  Farrar, Straus and Giroux, 1998.  ISBN 0-374-33664-4. 


Plot Summary

Joey is a young boy who has attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD).  His meds, when they work at all, wear off in the middle of the day.  Because of his actions while he is so wired, the adults in his life have run out of options on how to help him.


Critical Analysis

Jack Gantos has a way of weaving an entertaining tale even when dealing with a subject such as ADHD.  In Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key, Gantos describes the life of Joey Pigza from Joey’s point-of-view.  Joey is a good kid, but he’s wired bad.  He takes medication to help with his ADHD, but it wears off by lunchtime.  His body seems to have a mind of his own that he cannot control.  One afternoon, his teacher tries to help him work out his hyperactivity by getting him to sharpen a box of pencils for the class.  He sharpens all of the pencils to a fine point within an inch of the eraser.  Then he sharpened two pieces of chalk and made small fangs that he stuck in his mouth.  He was enjoying himself so much, he tried sharpening a popsicle stick that he found in the arts and crafts supplies.  That didn’t work out so well because the popsicle stick got jammed in the sharpener.  After yanking on the stick, he managed to get it out, but in the process, fell on the floor and broke his fangs.  When the teacher heard the commotion, Joey tried to stand as still as possible and pretend as if nothing happened.  When she went back to her schoolwork, Joey noticed that the pencil sharpener had large holes – large enough to stick a finger in.  His fingernails were so long that he scratched himself in his sleep.  He could use the pencil sharpener to cut his fingernails back…  One good turn of the pencil sharpener was all it took for shrieking, a cut finger, and a nail hanging on by a thread.

Gantos allows the readers to better understand that regardless of how hard Joey tries, and no matter what doctors his mom takes him to, things are just out of control for Joey.  Joey’s grandmother and father suffer from the same condition and have had to live in a state of semi-control their entire lives.  It seems as if all hope is lost that Joey’s fate will be any different than theirs.  Joey’s dad and grandmother left Joey’s mom to deal with this Tasmanian devil residing in the core of Joey’s body. 

Because Joey’s mom worked late, Joey kept his house key on a string.  For fun, he practiced swallowing the key and pulling the string to pull the key back up.  When his teacher caught him doing that during class, she took her sharp scissors out of her drawer and cut the string to keep Joey from doing that anymore.  Once she turned her back, he went back to his key-swallowing practice session.  After he swallowed the key, he remembered he had no string to pull the key back up.  He had to wait for nature to take its course.

The last straw was when Joey decided to make bumper stickers out of a piece of cardboard.  His safety scissors weren’t strong enough, so he quickly ran to the teacher’s desk and took her sharp scissors when no one was looking.  On the way back to his desk, he tripped and accidently sliced off the end of another student’s nose!  Gantos tells these incidents in such a way that the reader wants so badly to help Joey, but what can anyone do?   His mother and the school staff are at their wits end. 

Joey is sent to the Lancaster County Special Education Center.  His caseworker is known as Special Ed.  He wants to help Joey by getting more regulated medication and to teach him to make better decisions.  Joey is sent to the Children’s Hospital in Pittsburg for a brain SPECT test.  The doctor prescribed a transdermal patch to better regulate a steady dose of his medication 24 hours a day.  From the very first patch, Joey “could feel [himself] winding down like [he] was on a swing that was slowly stopping.”  When Joey goes back to school, one of the mothers told him that it gave her hope that if he got better, maybe one day her son would get better as well.

Joey Pigza Swallowed the Key is sad in some respects because it shows the struggles Joey faced trying to act like everyone else but being neurologically unable to do so.  For much of the story, it seemed as if nothing would ever help Joey act like other children his age.  But in the end, a treatment is found for Joey.  It doesn’t solve all of his problems, but it gives him the tools to start on the path to a non-hyper existence.

Readers of all ages can appreciate the tenacity of Joey to try to fit-in in spite of his condition, which fights against him every step of the way.  Joey’s triumphant over his set-backs can encourage others to keep trying even when all hope seems lost.  No matter how dark things may appear, there is always a glimmer of hope to which one must cling.  It is important to remember that it was the turtle who never gave up who won the race.  The going may be slow and tedious, but perseverance will make one victorious.  It also helps readers to realize the behavior of those around them may be something they cannot control.  An extra dose of patience and understanding will help everyone come out a winner.

 

Awards and Honors

California Young Reader Medal, 2002 Winner Junior High California
Judy Lopez Memorial Award for Children's Literature, 1999 Honor Book California
     United States
Maine Student Book Award, 1999 Third Place Maine
Maryland Children's Book Award, 2003 Winner Intermediate Maryland
National Book Award, 1998 Finalist Young People's Literature
Sasquatch Reading Award, 2001 Winner Washington
Virginia Young Readers Program, 2001 Winner Middle School Virginia

     

Review Excerpts

“Down deep, Joey's a good kid who struggles with ADD [Attention Deficit Disorder]. Told in the first person, from Joey's perspective, this fast-paced book is sometimes funny, and sometimes sad, but always entertaining." ~ Mary Jane,  BookHive

"Most teachers and students know at least one child with attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD), and this book will surely help them become more understanding, even as they enjoy Gantos' fresh writing style and tart sense of humor.” ~ Susan Dove Lempke, Booklist, December 15, 1998 (Vol. 95, No. 8)

"Gantos takes the reader into the fractured world of the child with what we today call ADHD. Whose road to what we might call normalcy is rocky beyond imagining. The reader follows that road in this story, with Joey's direct, edgy, matter-of-fact voice as guide. Gritty, often disturbing, yet ending with a glimpse of the awesome resilience of this young protagonist." ~  Uma Krishnaswami, Children's Literature


Other Books Written by Jack Gantos

Hole in My Life
Dead End in Norvelt
What Would Joey Do?

Visit his website for more information:  http://www.jackgantos.com/.


Book Connections

Anything But Typical by Nora Raleigh Baskin
Playing with Matches by Brian Katcher
ADHD by Philippa Pigache


Connection Activities

• Consider how Joey felt when he was told he would have to go to another school after accidently cutting off the tip of his classmate's nose.  How do you think he felt?  Have you ever felt like that?  Write a poem about how you or Joey felt.
• Joey talked about waiting hour upon hour by the window for his mother to return.  His grandmother told him that he was too bad for his mother to come back for him.  Do you think Joey's mother left him because he was bad?  Write a letter to Joey and tell him what you think.