Title: Raiders Night
Author: Robert Lipsyte
Published: August 1st, 2006
ISBN: 0060599464
Page number: 232
Price: $6.99 (pbk)
Genre: realistic fiction, sports fiction
Reading Level: 8th grade
Interest Level: 9-12th grade
Awards: Abraham Lincoln Award Nominee (2009)
Plot Summary: Matt is the captain of the high school football team and is revered throughout the school. He engages in teen drinking and seems to have his pick of girls to date. Being a Raider gives you popularity and power. But Matt and the rest of the football team, coaches included are willing to win at any cost. This includes taking steroids to improve performance. The team has acquired a new player who the coaches feel will provide the piece they need to carry their team to victory. But one can't simply join the Raider's football team, they have to earn it. Matt's co-captain, Ramp, is all too eager to haze the new players, including the bright prospect. But when Ramp's hazing plans cross the line Matt is put in a difficult position of choosing between his team loyalty and what is right.
Review: The story gives an inside look into the high school sports culture where it's program over integrity. The players will do anything to win and the coaches aren't willing to risk their programs good name due to scandal, instead their motto is to keep it in the locker room. Though as the book points out there are some things that shouldn't be kept in the locker room. A few things in the story did bother me. Mainly, there seems to be very little negative consequences from Matt's drinking or drug abuse. He seems to stop his steroid use just as easily as he started. The girls in the story seem all but to eager to sleep with him and he seems to not really care too much about their well being. In general the girls in the story come across as very one dimensional characters. But overall the story is one that hits home for many teens. There has been actual incidents much like the one in the book that has happend in high schools and colleges. The book shows that while difficult, it is important to stand up for what is right. Matt, and the rest of the Back Pack show this by refusing to stay quiet on Chris' sexual assault.
Reader's Annotation: Matt is a football star with the admiration of girls and guys alike and as the captain of the Raiders football team everything is going his way. But when with a win at any cost attitude Matt's troubles go beyond just his steroid use when a hazing prank at football camp goes to far. Now Matt needs to decide what a real leader does in the face of opposition and controversy.
Bibliotherapeutic usefulness: Often times the jock culture has a warped sense of team loyalty. There has been many scandals in which players and coaches cover up illegal activity for the sake of the teams image or to not ruin a chance at a championship. Raiders Night highlights this culture and exposes what can go wrong when you put team ahead of everything else. Teens can see how despite coaches and other players willingness to cover up what happend to Chris, Matt is not willing to let it go and decides that sometimes doing the right thing isn't easy.
Issues: The book deals with a lot controversial topics including drinking, drug use, sex, sexual abuse, foul language, and bullying. There is also a very graphic hazing scene in which Ramp, pees in the mouth of another player and then sexual assaults him with a bat.
Book Talk Ideas: The book has the "ripped from the headlines" type of vibe and using that idea would be a great book talk. The book talk should be written almost as a news story, start of with a headline, "Controversy rocks high profile football team" and then give a few details to draw in the reader.
Main Themes: hazing, bullying, drugs, addiction, sexual abuse
Read-alikes: Keeper by Mal Peet and Halfback Tough by Thomas Dygard
Author Website: http://www.robertlipsyte.com/
Professional Reviews:
Kirkus Review
Publishers Weekly
