Official Review: Mr. Nimbus and the school Bullies

[Ramona]

[Following is the official OnlineBookClub.org review of "Mr. Nimbus and the school Bullies" by Leon Opio.]

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1 out of 4 stars

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I chose to read Mr. Nimbus and the School Bullies by Leon Opio because of the topic. It is a fiction book for middle schoolers dealing with bullying in school as well as in other places where young people are hanging out.

The story is about two bullies at Jamestown Middle School, Mark and Matthew Davey, who were terrorizing the whole school and two students, Jonathan and George, in particular. Jonathan was hoping the bullies would have moved to another school during the summer. Of course that did not happen and the bullying continued on the first day of the new school year.

The new gym teacher, Mr. Nimbus, just happened to witness some of it before school started that morning. He also saw it first hand in the gym class in which all four of these students attended. Mr. Nimbus realized that his secret plan of intervention could soon be put to use. But he had to be careful not to reveal his means of doing so.

As a child, Mr. Nimbus had been bullied. He went to live with his grandparents when he was four years old, because his parents had died. After his grandfather died, he continued to live with his grandmother. At some point after he started school, the bullying began. He did not tell her when the bullying started for fear she would go to the school about it. The bullying was bad enough; he was afraid that teacher involvement would make it worse.

He did not know about the family secret at first. His grandparents had felt he did not need to know. One day he had a very strange experience at home. He was thinking about the bullies and feeling sorry for himself when it happened. When he told his grandmother about the incident, she then revealed the family secret to him. It was during this conversation that he finally was able to tell his grandmother about being bullied. It was after that that he learned how to use the family secret.

As an adult, he felt that becoming a teacher was the best thing he could do to be able to use his secret to help others. Both the students being bullied and the bullies would benefit from it. The secret had the potential to eliminate the bullying. It could help the bullies to see their need to quit their mean behavior and to actually become happy, friendly students themselves.

The targeted students of the first morning of Mr. Nimbus' teaching position at the Jamestown Middle School were very reluctant to trust this new teacher. In fact, they were not telling any adults about what was going on. Any students who saw the bullying were afraid to get involved because that would make them targets also.

Eliza was a girl whom Jonathan secretly liked and she was also one of the Davey brothers' targets. Mr. Nimbus started asking questions when he saw things happening, but the students made excuses about the incidents. So on the second day of school, he asked Jonathan to come into his office at the end of class. All that had happened in just the first two days was just too much for Jonathan to take. He broke down and told Mr. Nimbus the whole story.

Mr. Nimbus took an opportunity to speak alone with Jonathan, George, and Eliza. He told them a very simple thing that had helped him as a child and that they could do. He did not and could not tell them how it would actually help them resolve the problem. It left them thinking that their teacher was weird and crazy. It seemed so silly and simplistic to them, but then they decided that they had nothing to lose by trying what he said.

Mr. Opio, the author of this book, had a great idea for a story. Although Mr. Nimbus' secret seemed fantastical and the bullying was probably a little too quickly brought to a halt for real life, the story addressed a much needed issue. Bullying is far too prevalent in our schools and on our streets today.

The author included many great plot points along the way. It could have been a 4-star book but it was filled with grammar issues. There were errors on many of the pages, far too many to be simply typographical errors and far too many to have been overlooked by a proofreader.

Sometimes an apostrophe "s" was omitted or the apostrophe was simply misplaced. Along with tense changes mid-sentence throughout the book, there were some run-on sentences. There were a couple sentences where the last phrase of the previous sentence should have been the beginning phrase of the following sentence. "There" was substituted for "their" and "to" and "too" were interchanged at least once. Sometimes the past tense ending ("ed") of a verb was omitted.

A few times, I had to go back and re-read a paragraph to follow the story line. Most transitions were fine but a few were not always as clear as I would have liked. And often throughout the story I felt as though the writer was "telling, not showing" the story. The author sometimes skimmed over scenes that could have been developed into real showing experiences. Showing is not always easy, but a good beta reader or professional editor could have helped with this and with the other issues.

Mr. Opio did use some vivid imagery. For example, his descriptions of how folks were dressed and what their features looked like were important in certain scenes and helped to move the story along.

Although not an error as such, there was one (and only one) place in the story where, at least in schools where I have worked, the teacher would have reprimanded or gently cautioned a student about certain word choices. When Mr. Nimbus was talking alone with the three students, one of them used a swear word. The author could have easily replaced it with a word or phrase more appropriate for a middle schooler to use in a teacher's presence, especially when on school property.

Since a sample of the book was allowed, I downloaded the sample first before committing to read the story, so I did know what I was getting into... well, somewhat. But the topic intrigued me and I wanted to know how the author was going to handle it. I took notes of many of the grammatical issues throughout the whole book. In re-reading the first five chapters just to be sure I was not exaggerating, I found something on each of those pages that should have been edited. Some were minor problems, but they were still in need of attention. If the book had been edited, it would have been a wonderful story. The story ideas were imaginative and creative. The ideas at the close of the story could be helpful to students who are being subjected to bullying in their schools and elsewhere.

Because of the lack of editing, I rate this book 1 out of 4 stars. If it had been edited, I would have recommended that parents read this book either with their children or separately for discussion. If parents and children could discuss issues before these things begin, perhaps both young children and teenagers would be more free to talk about them and get help when it happens, instead of enduring the abuse and hoping the abusers would just go away.

With its poor grammar and sentence structure issues, I cannot recommend this book. IF properly edited, Mr. Nimbus and the School Bullies would be a 4-star story and then it would be a great read for middle school children and younger.

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Mr. Nimbus and the school Bullies
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Like Ramona's review? Post a comment saying so!

-- 19 Oct 2015, 19:33 --

Okay, fellow reviewers... this was my second review and I understand some of the issues. The summary was way too long for starters, as well as some other things. How would you have rated a book that was a great story but had a lot of grammatical issues? My initial thoughts were that I really couldn't recommend it until the issues were corrected. I'm thinking now that maybe it should have been a 2 instead of a 1. I'm just a real grammar freak and so that was my impression after really thinking it over a lot. I'm really wanting some good constructive thinking on your part, especially from you who have been reading and reviewing on here for a long time. I value your input. Thank you to anyone who wants to kick in on this!

[bookowlie]

I am going to read this review and give you my thoughts about the rating you choose, since you are looking for input. However, I am off to bed right now so I will be back here to post my thoughts tomorrow.

[Ramona]

Thank you, Bookowlie! I look forward to your thoughts!!!

[bookowlie]

I enjoyed reading your review. You gave good constructive criticism and were able to point out the positive aspects of the book. It's always hard to read a book when you need to reread some passages for clarity. I am going to PM you my thoughts about how to view errors in a book when deciding on the rating.

[kimmyschemy06]

I find it an interesting story to read since bullying is a prevalent issue today. I'm also curious about the 'family secret' and I would be happy to find out what it was As for grammatical errors, as a teacher, I'm very particular with them when it comes to my students, but I can be lenient if I'm reading to be entertained.

[Ramona]

I find it an interesting story to read since bullying is a prevalent issue today. I'm also curious about the 'family secret' and I would be happy to find out what it was As for grammatical errors, as a teacher, I'm very particular with them when it comes to my students, but I can be lenient if I'm reading to be entertained.

Thank you, kimmyschemy06 for your input. I'm learning to be a little more lenient! I probably would upgrade the rating to a 2 now that I've gotten some input from others as to how they view and rate errors. As a grammar freak and a short stint at teaching and some subbing in schools, I have a low tolerance for grammatical errors, but I'm learning on this review website that there IS a difference between the classroom and the review site!! Content is more important than grammar when reading to review, although I still value correct grammar very highly.