Swim the Fly

 By Don Calame

A Book Review by Charlie Gilbert

This story is a fictional novel which made me laugh right up to the end. It is a story about a teenage boy named Matt Gratton and his friends Coop and Sean. What happens is every year they set themselves a goal and this year’s goal is to see a live naked girl.

In their swim squad is a new girl named Kelly who Matt is keen to impress, so when the swim coach asks for volunteers to swim 4 lengths Butterfly Matt decides to put up his hand.

Matt lives with his family which includes a crazy Grandad with a goatee who is trying to pick up the widow lady down the road!  His plan includes getting Matt to help him.

Matt and his friends try all sorts of schemes to achieve their goal of seeing a girl while Matt tries to train in private ready for the big race.  He even takes some protein powder from his Mum which turn out to be laxatives.

 They heard that a girl they want to see naked is going to a community centre so they dress up like girls. In the changing room he sees Matt sees Kelly and quickly runs into a toilet stall and this is when the laxatives decide to come out!!  His named underpants end up blocking the girl’s toilets and cause a major flood!

Kelly’s best friend Valerie is kind and Matt enjoys her company and likes to ask her lots of questions about Kelly.

There are many funny moments in this story including a party and Matt nearly having his appendix removed.

The ending is a real happy one for Matt, his friends and the girls.

I think the author was saying to never be afraid to step up to challenges in your life and that sometimes the best things have been right in front of you the whole time.

This novel was easy to read with small chapters and hard to put down.  It made me laugh out loud as I read it.  I enjoyed reading about the challenges of swimming and hard work.

I would recommend this book to anyone who likes to laugh, people who enjoy stories about teenage life and to those who enjoy swimming.  It contains some rude words but I think it seems appropriate for this story.

Our soccor game was defaulted today so I'm watching 2 Fast 2 Furious on tv and also the commonwealth games.  I love watching the swimming, they are so fast.
Ben came to stay for the last two nights but we didn't get to do much around swimming and school.  We have a new pet lamb, a wee boy which Dad says we can't keep but Mum wants to, he is real cute, his Mum died.  We might go to Dunedin later today after Danny's soccor it is Danny's birthday on Monday and he's pretty excited about it, I know what he's getting but won't tell him.

Well, it is nearly the end of the holidays they went too quick!
We went out for dinner last night to Fat Sally's which was yummy.  This last week I have been swimming and playing with Dad on the Xbox.  We got a new game called Don Bradman Cricket.  Don was the best batsman in the world and played for Australia.  We have had a lot of laughs playing each other I am usually Australia and Dad is New Zealand. Don Bradman is the only player who doesn't wear any helmet because he played 80 years ago when they didn't wear them.  I won most of the games because Australia are good all-rounders.
I bowled Dad's best batsman on the very first ball which was especially good because Dad had been skiting before he came out.
On the way to swimming last night it was all quiet and I was putting on my shoes at he back door, I heard a noise like horses running, next minute around the corner came Mr Grinch chased by Benson it looked hilarious.

We have just arrived back from a night away in Omarama.  We visited Lake Tekapo for the day and went to the hot pools and ice skating.  Danny and Dad went on the snow park slides but the wait for a turn in line was very long!  I asked Dad if I was old enough for the adult pool he said NO! I did a huge fart at the Tekapo café and everyone turned around.
When we went through Twizel my Dad said there was a beautiful camping ground and we should stay there, when we saw it we couldn't believe our eyes, the cabins were old with missing windows and there was just enough room to lie down, this was Dads idea of a joke which no one thought was funny.  We had dinner at the pub.  I had a great pie at the bakery in Fairlie.  On the way home we stopped to look at the Waitaki Dam.  When we got home Mum opened the door and Mr Grinch our cat ran out - he had been locked inside all this time!  We searched the house for any poos but he had managed to hold on, good boy!!!!