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ABOUT THE BOOK
NO SPOILERSRoy Eberhardt is the new kid in Coconut Cove, Florida, and he already has plenty of problems: a bully named Dana Matherson who torments him on the school bus, and a strange barefoot boy he spots running past the bus one morning. When Roy tracks down the running boy, he discovers that the kid is living on his own in an empty lot and junkyard, secretly working to stop a pancake restaurant chain from bulldozing the land where a small colony of protected burrowing owls has made its home. Roy gets pulled deeper into the mystery as he tries to figure out who the boy is, why he is so determined, and whether there is any legal way to save the owls before the bulldozers start.
Free Battle of the Books questions for Hoot
SPOILERSEvery one of these has the same answer, and that is the point. In a real battle the question is read aloud with a dozen other books in play, and students have a few seconds to place it. Here is what a battle might ask about Hoot. Use them as a quiz, a trivia round, or BOTB practice.
Where in the book they come from
- Early in the book
In what book does a sleepy officer wake to find his car windows spray-painted black?
✓ Answer
Hoot by Carl Hiaasen
Officer Delinko dozes off during his stakeout, and someone paints all his cruiser windows black while he sleeps inside. The embarrassing incident lands him on desk duty for a month.
- First half
In what book does a girl reveal that the barefoot running boy is actually her stepbrother?
✓ Answer
Hoot by Carl Hiaasen
In the dark icecream truck, Beatrice finally tells Roy that the mysterious runner is her brother. This is the moment Roy starts to be let into their secret.
- First half
In what book is a former beauty queen hired to play a granny pancake mascot in a gray wig?
✓ Answer
Hoot by Carl Hiaasen
Kimberly Lou Dixon, a former beauty pageant runner-up turned actress, plays the kindly granny in the restaurant commercials. The company wants her to appear at the groundbreaking ceremony before she leaves to film a movie.
- Second half
In what book do two boys sit on the bleached roof of a sunken crab boat hidden in the mangroves?
✓ Answer
Hoot by Carl Hiaasen
Mullet Fingers takes Roy to the wreck of the Molly Bell, a crab boat sunk decades ago in a tidal creek. Its pilothouse roof is just wide enough for two boys to dangle their legs over the water.
- Second half
In what book does a bully swear an oath on his mother's dead parakeet?
✓ Answer
Hoot by Carl Hiaasen
Forced to promise he will never beat Roy up again, Dana swears on the grave of Natalie, his mom's dead parakeet, since it is the only dead person he knows. Roy suspects the bird did not die of natural causes.
- Near the end
In what book does a buried boy tell an actress, "You bury those birds, you gotta bury me, too"?
✓ Answer
Hoot by Carl Hiaasen
Mullet Fingers stuffs his whole skinny body into a burrow so only his head pokes out at the ceremony. He warns Mother Paula that to bulldoze the birds, they will have to bury him too.
