Review of "Bertie Comes Through," by Henry Gregor Felsen

 Review of

Bertie Comes Through, by Henry Gregor Felsen

Four out of five stars

Success comes very late, but it comes

 Bertie Poddle is a student at Heeble High School and is the epitome of the athlete wannabe with no real hope of success. He is overweight, slow and has an aversion to strenuous physical exertion. He is also very shy and fumbling in the presence of girls. There are two that he interacts with the most. Marcia is a cheerleader and Hyacinth is a skinny girl, but rather muscular. She is capable of causing pain in even the toughest of boys when shaking their hands. Hyacinth is also more than willing to engage in a fight with anyone that displeases her, independent of gender.

 Bertie tries out for every sport at Heeble High but is a failure at every one. He gets creamed at football, knocked around at boxing, can barely run 100 yards without collapsing and cannot even carry the big drum for the marching band without stumbling. Yet, he never gives up and at the end of the school year his degree of effort is rewarded.

 This is a young adult story about perseverance and trying out all options before accepting your athletic fate. It is a good story with some unusual humor. Furthermore, at a time when girls rarely appeared in sports fiction books, the females in this story are strong personalities that help the weaker boys when they need the appropriate encouragement. Very rare for 1947.

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