Sarcastic, twenty-something amateur sleuth Madeline Dare, grown-up child of hippie parents, takes a job as a teacher at an elite, if fairly cult-ish private school for troubled teens. The head guru in charge, Santangelo, promises desperate parents results, no matter what technique he has to employ to get them, including isolation and humiliation. Madeline, who’s having nasty flashbacks about her own dad’s bizarre child-raising methods, is having serious doubts about whether she can continue to teach using Santangelo’s “unorthodox” techniques. Then, two of her fav students turn up dead and Madeline rejects the hypothesis that the kids offed themselves and instead begins to dig for evidence of corruption at the highest levels. Turns out that pseudo-suicides are the LEAST of what shady Santangelo has under his ridiculously pretentious opera cape. This bitterly funny mystery by Edgar Award-nominated author Cornelia Read has a great cast of teen characters, but the best voice is that of jaded, wickedly witty slacker sleuth Madeline Dare herself. This is one seriously dark comedic nailbiter.
This sounds really good. What other stuff has she written?
This is her second novel–there is more info about her on her website–just google her name.
I had very very high hopes for this book. I take joy in the summer months in having time to read. This book was a large disappointment.
I love this website, and have found many wonderful things to read. This was not one of them.
The Crazy School has a very very high level of profanity. At the school where the novel takes place, there is no rule about language except for F***, but the author still includes it.
For those who do not want to read sentences filled with profanity, this book is not for you.
Reading Rants, maybe you could start rating the language in books?
Thanks.
Hi Katherine,
I’m sorry this one was a no-go for you. Despite the profanity, I still think this is a good read for HS students, and know several who have liked it. And I won’t be rating language in books, simply because what bothers one person may not bother someone else and you always need to discover for yourself what your threshold is. I know when I dislike a book, I put it down and start another. There are just too many books and too little time!