Koertge, Ron. The Arizona Kid. Boston: Little, Brown & Co. 1988. ISBN-10: 0316501018
Summary
Billy, who wants to be a vetrnarian, is spending the summer in Tuscon with his uncle and working at the racetrack. Uncle Wes owns a store that sells Southwestern jewlry and art. In his spare time he dates and is an activist for the gay community. In the summer that Billy spends with him he trades his sneakers for a pair of boots and abandons his sunscreen for a ten gallon hat. At the racetrack Billy meets Jack, the horsetrainer and Billy's boss, Lew, Billy's coworker and Cara Mae who exercises the horses and becomes Billy's girlfriend. Billy's is far from home but he finds that he fits in anyway.
Evaluation
Overall The Arizona Kid is a sweet story about growing up and making your own decisions. It's also a thoughtful look at a new lifestyle. In the end, Billy finds that the Tuscon lifestyle is the one he has to get used to, not his uncle's gay lifestyle.Modern readers will find more to appreciate in the character of Billy. Uncle Wes represents a side of the gay community and the AIDS academic that will hopefully seem like history to modern readers.
Reader's Annotation
In Bradleyville Missouri, Billy had all the right t-shirts and the newest sneakers. But when he spends the summer in Tuscon with his uncle Wes, Billy trades them in for button down shirts and boots. He fits right in at the racetrack.Billy's team is the bottom of the heap, but Billy and Lew bet more money than they have that by the end of the summer they'll have a winning horse.
Bibliotherapeutic Usefulness
Acceptance of other lifestyles, especially GLBQT. AIDS
Genre and Subject
Growing up, romance, homosexuality
Why I read it
Recommended by a classmate as a lighthearted story.
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