Diary of a Wimpy Kid (book)

Diary of a Wimpy Kid is a children's book by Jeff Kinney. The story is about a 7th grader named Greg Heffley and his life in the 7th grade, from picking seats on the first day to Christmas vacation to the last day. Released in 2007 through Abrams Books, the novel, which switches between handwritten text and comic book-style illustration, received positive reviews from Publishers Weekly and School Library Journal upon its release.

It was originally shown as a web-book on Funbrain, which has been published in book form. The book is the first in a five part series by Kinney. The second book will be published in Janurary sometime in the first two weeks and is already in warehouses and is going to start getting shipped in Janurary 1, 2008.

Major Characters

Greg Heffley: the main character and owner of the diary [the wimpy kid]. Greg is sometimes selfilsh,ignorant and vain.Greg is also thinking up scam's from time to time.Greg takes advantage of his,rather dim-witted and naive,friend Rowley Jefferson.Greg will also let Rowley take the blame for something he did.Greg is not very athletic,much to his father's disapontment.Greg also tried to explained to his father that you can play football,baseball,basketball and other sports on his game system without "getting all sweaty and stuff" after his father told him to play outside.Greg also has a huge dislike for a comic called "l'il cutie", which is descibed by Greg as the lamest comic ever.Greg's father sems to agree with him.Greg's older brother Rodrick buys him a book called "The Best Of L'il Cutie" every christmas since he knows Greg hates the comic.Greg's life, as he discibes it,is the lamest life a 7th grader could live.

Rodrick Heffley: Greg's older brother.Rodrick is a mean,ignorant,selfish and sneaky teen.Rodrick loves heavy metal music and has a band called "LODED DIPER!".Rodrick loves to pick on Greg,humilate Greg and make Greg Misrable.Rodrick is one of the few character's who has eyebrows.Rodrick also has a liking for "Shrunken Heads".

Manny Heffley: Greg's younger brother, who calls Greg "Bubby".Manny is also very small and has overbite.Manny has an art for getting away with anything because he is the smallest,the baby and because he can use his cute looks to get out of trouble,although Frank and ann probaly wouldn't grounded Manny or anything.

Ann Heffley: Greg's mother.Ann is a middle class mom who is caring,but somtimes overcaring.Ann is a good mom and wife,but sometimes embarreses her children/husband,but is nearly always cheery and accepting,although rather lame,gifts from other people,relitives and friends. She also likes to call Greg "Honeybunches",which usally embarrasses Greg. The fact that she never removes her glasses bears a resemblence to June Drabble,anothor cartoon character.

Frank Heffley: Greg's father. Frank likes sports,reading and "building character". Frank hates video games,rock 'n' roll and Bill. Frank likes doing outdoor project's and wieght lifting and many other "Manly Things". Frank also encourages Rodrick,Greg and Manny to do "Manly Stuff" with him,especially since Greg was younger and Frank tried to encorage him to work out so he could have big muscles,only to have Greg respond with:Muscles are GROSS!!!. Frank also has a habit of doing stuff for other people if they don't do things right,much to Rodricks pleasure,especially since he "play's dumb" with his homework. Frank's also had a cat,which his father told him ran away and was very,very happy,although in reality the dog froze to death on the front porch (in winter) because Frank's dad forgot to let him in. Year's later when Frank's dad came over for a family visit in the winter,he told Frank the truth,since he said he and Frank could probaly laugh about it by now,but Frank threw his dad out of the house without his giving him his jacket.

Rowley Jefferson: Greg's best friend who usually helps with Greg with his schemes.Rowley is dim-witted and naive.Rowley's intelligence is not very high.

Fregley: Greg's neighbor, and an all-around strange boy. Fregley also has a "secret Freckle". Fregley also has a liking for stuffing dirt in his ears and beating kites with a stick. Also likes hanging out on his front lawn. He also likes wrestling,playing twister and chasing people around with a booger on his finger. Fregley also is not allowed to have sugar,because he gets "crazy". Fregley has shown some signs of possibly being gay.

Bill: Bill is one of Rodrick's friend who plays in Rodrick's band "LODED DIPER!". Bill is much older than Rodrick and has the look of a surfer. Bill is probaly in his mid-to late 40s. Frank has a big dislike for Bill.

Chirag: A boy who supposedly moves away to California but at the last few days his dad decides not to take the job in California and Chirag stays. He is the victim of a stupid practical prank that takes the length of literally five months until Greg, the ringleader gets in trouble and somehow become's Chirag's friend.

On the Web version Piper, she doesn't go to Gregs school and he has a crush on her.

On the Web version, Gramma (Ann's mother) is also a major character. Gramma is retired and is very much like her daughter,but Ann is somtimes overpowerd by her.

On the Web version, Grampa (Frank's father) is a major character. Grampa also had a "ladyfriend",which Ann does not like her to much. Grampa also is responsible for the death of Frank's childhood dog,since he froze to death on the front porch in winter because he forgot to let him in. Granpa told Frank that his dog ran away and was very,very happy. Years later when Grampa came over for a family in the winter he told Frank what really happend since he figured that Frank and him could laugh about it by now. Frank responded by throwing him out of the house with giving him his jacket.

Plot

Greg Heffley and his friend Rowley are "undersized weaklings" in their school, hoping simply to just survive, but when Rowley's fame starts to grow, Greg must take drastic measures to save their friendship.

Greg's Mom and Her Hilarious Ideas

Cultural significance in Greg's life is his Mom's art of coming up with hilarious systems. Read about some here.

The Swear Jar

Pracitcally one of the funniest parts is the Swear Jar. Five-year-old Manny wants to be educated well by Mom, and Mom does not want Manny to be exposed to "swear words" and "cuss words". So she develops the "Swear Jar". Whenever she catches Greg, Rodrick, and even his Dad swearing, especially around Manny, they have to pay the Swear Jar--literally. And this is the catch: Manny gets to keep all the money in the Swear Jar for himself.

Mom Bucks

Another comical part of the story takes place when Mom cracks up about Greg and Rodrick always complaining about them not having money to spend. Mom Bucks is a system in which they earn play money by doing extra chores and they can cash it in for money or getting out of doing chores. The end of Mom Bucks takes place when Greg "borrows" all the play money from his friend's board game set and uses it as Mom Bucks, and Mom never notices, until Greg is unprepared for an assignment that was given to Rodrick several years back by the same teacher. Greg wants to use Rodrick's assignment but Rodrick is charging ten hundred Mom Bucks for it, so Greg gives him the Mom Bucks and then Rodrick tries to cash it all in at the same time for a motorcycle and Mom realizes that he's up to something because she knew he does NOT have that much Mom Bucks, so she finds out about Greg's stash of Mom Bucks in his room and that's when Mom Bucks is officially over.

Addiction to Videogames

A MAJOR cultural significance in Greg's life is videogames. He likes nearly every type of videgames; the book mentions that he's totally addicted to as series of videogames called "Twisted Wizard". The book also mentions that he played a racing game called "Formula One Racing" with Rowley and about 40 other videogames that Rowley owns. Greg's addiction is so emphasized that when he is banned from videogames he goes over to Collin's house to play videogames there. Later in the book Greg gets extremely mad when Mom buys Manny some educational videogames and makes him share the system with Manny. Greg also wants to name his soccer team "Twisted Wizards" and get the "Game Zone" to sponsor it. Later he also enters a videogames tornament.

Book Series

1 Diary of a Wimpy Kid
2 Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules!
3 Diary of a Wimpy kid: The Last Straw
4 unknown name, about Greg's summer
5 unknown name

The Cheese

Supposedly one of the most important parts of the book, the Cheese has appeared the year before the diary starts being written in a basketball court in the middle school. The Cheese is a moldy and slimy mess, a "thing" around which great disgust revolves. No one dares to touch the thing until someone trips and brushes "it" with his finger. He then starts the Cheese Touch, which is basically the same thing as the game Tag or Cooties, where one passes the Cheese Touch to another person, and you can protect yourself from it by crossing your middle and forefinger. The person with the Cheese Touch eventually tags someone, who moves in the summer directly before the diary starts being written to another state in the country, so he takes the Cheese Touch with him. No one touches The Cheese until the end of the book, where a group of terrorizing cronies named the Herbie Reamers (the ringleader's name is Herbie Reamer) forces Rowley to eat half of The Cheese. They were about to force Greg to eat the other half but Greg comes up with the lamest and funniest excuse ever (" i would But I'm allergic to dairy!") Believe it or not, that gets Greg out of that situation and Rowley is forced to eat the second half of The Cheese too.

References

School Library Journal, March 2007.
Publishers Weekly, 2007.

Diary of A Wimpy Kid

External links

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