Middle School – Going Bush

Going Bush by James Patterson and Martin Chatterton is a Middle School adventure for 11 year olds about a boy who swaps a diner's washing-up for the Australian outback.

What happens

Rafe Khatchadorian is a teenager now (he's decided that explains why he's so fed up). He's scraping plates at Swifty's Diner, and the boy drying them is Miller the Killer, the bully who's made it his mission to make Rafe's life miserable.

Then a very posh letter arrives. Rafe has been picked as the American Young Artist for a two-week art camp in Australia's Northern Territory. And his friend Ellie is on the list too.

Mum needs persuading. School needs persuading. After that there's a tiny propeller plane, a pilot who fixes the engine by whacking it with a spanner and a landing on a dirt road just ahead of a massive truck.

The camp is run by Brushes McGarrity, a painter off the telly with a wire beard and a singing voice that knocks bats out of the sky. There are no tents and no toilets. Just a swag each and a little spade (you can work out what that's for).

That's the kind of humour you're getting, and a lot of it. Rafe talks straight to you, with lists, daydreams and a running score against the grown-ups. Underneath the jokes, though, he's properly serious about his art. He's been filling sketchbooks with ideas from traditional Aboriginal paintings and he wants to see the real thing.

Rafe is growing up in this one. He talks about hormones, a girl has kissed him, and he's confused about how he feels about Ellie. There's lots of farting and words like "buttwad" and "sucks". If your reader is fine with that sort of cheek, they'll have a great time.

It picks up after earlier books too (Rafe mentions his last trip to Australia and a spell on a tough outdoor programme), so it isn't the place to start.

What to read next

If they haven't met Rafe yet, begin with The Worst Years of My Life, where his first day of middle school goes wrong in about four and a half minutes.