Gianna's Summer Reading Response

            “Bystander” by James Preller is a book about a boy named Eric Hayes who has recently moved to Long Island with his mother and his brother with hopes of “starting over”. Surprisingly, Eric fits in nicely, or so he thinks, and he starts becoming friends with a group of boys including Griffin Connelly. But Eric quickly realizes that something is a little off with their friendship, especially when he sees that Griffin is a bully. Throughout the book, Eric is able to see that Griffin is a bully to David Hallenback, even if others think it’s just a game.

            On page 122, when David denies that Griffin bullies him, Eric replies, “Griffin is a bad guy!” Even though David was constantly getting picked on by Griffin, he was desperate to believe that he was accepted by the group.  Eric tries to show David that Griffin was not his friend and that he was actually a bad guy, but David just walked away, avoiding the idea of Griffin not liking him.

            On page 128, when Eric is talking about Griffin with the other boys, they explain why Griffin picks on David so much by saying, “Hallenback is a loser. You know how annoying he is, Eric. That kid deserves a little roughing up now and then. It’s like he asks for it.” None of the boys act like its weird that Griffin picks on David. They all act like its David’s fault that he gets bullied. Only Eric is able to see that what Griffin does is wrong.

            On page 75, when David tries to include himself in the group, Eric said, “No matter what happened, he kept coming back for more, desperate for acceptance. So no matter how hard he got shoved away, Hallenback always seemed to dust himself off and bounce back.” David was so in denial that he didn’t care if the other boys called him names or pushed him down. It didn’t phase him that they thought he was annoying or that they didn’t like him, he just wanted to be included, and Eric knew that.

             As you can see, Eric tried to warn David many times throughout the book that Griffin was not interested in being his friend. This happens many times in the real world as well. People only care about being accepted or included in order to be “cool”. It’s not cool to be bully, but it’s definitely not cool to be a bystander, either.