Stryker

Stryker is a middle-grade novel that recounts the adventures of 12-year-old Harold Stryker and his friends TNT and Blunt as they race through dark tunnels on an old handcar. Twelve-year-old Harold Stryker lives all alone, in secret, in his house outside Los Angeles. He avoids, as best as he can, other kids--and certainly grown-ups. He keeps only his huge, gassy dog and his collection of power tools for company. But he's okay with all that. Until the big night of the little earthquake....
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Stryker is a middle-grade novel that recounts the adventures of 12-year-old Harold Stryker and his friends TNT and Blunt as they race through dark tunnels on an old handcar. Twelve-year-old Harold Stryker lives all alone, in secret, in his house outside Los Angeles. He avoids, as best as he can, other kids--and certainly grown-ups. He keeps only his huge, gassy dog and his collection of power tools for company. But he's okay with all that. Until the big night of the little earthquake. And his plunge into a dangerous forgotten tunnel beneath his dining room floor. And his encounter with the sweet, terrifying girl baseball star named Tien Tang and the compulsive, camo-suited, overweight force of nature known officially as Bella but universally as Blunt. They push and pull him through an underground adventure with a bullying science teacher, a tasteless chef, a greedy criminal, hairy tarantulas (live), sabertooth cats (long dead), a sweet guy who only looks bad, an aunt who's not related to her nephew, smelly mushrooms, old trolley cars, new subways, and a baker's dozen of illegal Asian immigrants who need to be rescued from a life of slavery in a California ghost town. Harold Stryker is okay with all that too. But those two girls are now his friends. And that has him shaking.