The Terrible Two

“Notice the scowl. Notice the gloom. Notice the way his face is pressed against the window and he looks like he’s trying to escape.”

The author introduces Miles while he is in the car traveling to his new home. The author invites the reader into the narrative by addressing them and asking them to notice Miles’s facial expressions. His scowl and distant stare out the window convey his sadness at having to leave his home and move to a new town. The accompanying illustration also depicts Miles’s sad face.

“Miles ate his eggs. They tasted like dread, although that might’ve just been the dread.”

Figurative language describes Miles’s feelings about starting a new school. He can almost taste his anxiety in his food. The author breaks from the figurative and moves to the literal in explaining that Miles’s anxiety might be affecting his appetite which is a common side effect of anxious thoughts and feelings.

“Miles smiled for the first time since leaving his old town. That was a pretty good prank.”

When Miles apprehensively approaches his new school and sees that someone has enacted an epic prank on day one, his entire countenance changes. In seeing the prank, he recognizes something for which he too has a passion, and it brings him joy. However, his joy is short-lived as he realizes that his plan to become the top prankster in the school might be in jeopardy if there’s already a prankster on campus.

“Then Josh muttered under his breath (but Miles heard him), ‘You nimbus.’”

Traditionally, a nimbus is a cloud or aura surrounding a person or thing. More colloquially, the term refers to an annoying person. The term is Josh’s favorite insult. He uses it against anyone in his way, including adults.

“Principal Barkin’s face was so red that it was almost purple, like a grape, or a particularly nice sunset over the ocean back home.”

Several aspects of Principal Barkin’s personality give him a comedic, almost cartoon-like personality. One of those characteristics is his face’s tendency to turn a deep red when he is angry. Here the author employs figurative language to describe the shade of his enraged face.

“Miles tilted his tray and spilled his lunch all over the front of his own clothes. Now he was covered in turkey chili, tomato soup, and macaroni and cheese.”

Spilling one’s lunch tray, especially on the first day of school, would be humiliating for most. However, Miles intentionally spills his food to create a diversion and get back at Josh. This strategy illustrates Miles’s quick thinking and his willingness to take risks to establish his identity as the top prankster at school.

“Because Bob has a big mouth! But I made him swear that he wouldn’t tell Dad. Barkins’ honor.”

The events of the first day of school exasperate Principal Barkin and a phone call from his father at dinner further deepen his woes. The phone call reveals the complicated dynamics in the Barkin family and explains Barry’s rigid leadership style as a school principal. His response appears juvenile as he bickers with his wife and refers to his brother in a whiny, immature tone.

“The hallway buzzed.”

The author uses figurative language to describe the scene in the school after Miles sends out the fake invitation. The halls do not literally buzz like a bee, but the party invitations create a hive-like mentality as the students cluster to speculate over the exclusive party and its elusive host. The authors capture the essence of a middle school environment using sensory language.

“When you are planning a prank it is important to plan for any contingency, and Miles had planned for this.”

One of Miles’s strengths as a prankster is his extensive planning. His detailed prankster notebook gives him a sense of pride and accomplishment. When Principal Barkin arrives at the fake party, Miles already has a plan in place to keep an adult from ruining the prank. The irony is that the prank is foiled by another kid, not an adult.

“A prankster often communicates with another prankster by writing a message on a rubber chicken.”

Niles’s revealing of himself as the school prankster marks a turning point in the narrative. Miles now not only knows that he is not the only prankster in town but is also astonished to learn the star student, the teacher’s pet, is also a trickster. The chicken is also an invitation for Miles to join forces with Niles, something he did not see coming.

“The silver track pants swished down the hall and disappeared around the corner.”

The author uses figurative language to describe the sound of the coach’s pants as he rushes down the hallway. The author incorporates humor into the story, particularly with the adult characters. Miles’s fake invitation advertising free bacon sends the teacher, who is on a low-carb diet, racing toward the cafeteria.

“It’s just a jerk move. And a violation of the Prankster’s Oath.”

Miles hates to admit it, but Niles knows more about pranking than he does. Until now, Miles has worked alone in his pranks, but after meeting Niles, he learns that there is a code of honor amongst pranksters. Niles teaches Miles that even in pranking, one must hold to a set of morals and standards.

“The feeling of crickets on flesh. The noise—the collective chirping more like a constant screech, like a car spinning through an intersection.”

The author uses figurative language to describe the chaos of hundreds of crickets loose in the classroom. Not only are the insects deafeningly loud, but they are also physically revolting. Miles recalls the horror of the scene as he awaits his punishment from Principal Barkin.

“Well, my oral report was on the pharaohs of Egypt. These crickets were supposed to represent the plague of locusts. You know, from the Ten Plagues?”

This passage is a reference to the Biblical account of the 10 plagues of Egypt from the book of Exodus. In the story, God sends 10 different plagues to Egypt in response to the pharaoh’s refusal to release the Hebrews from slavery. One of the plagues is locusts, which destroy the crops.

“The smile was an omen. A portent. The smile meant a prank was coming. Sometimes, late at night, Miles wondered if the smile was the prank.”

Niles’s duality haunts Miles as the prank war continues. He cannot make sense of how Niles can be so sweet and innocent at school but be a ruthless prankster behind closed doors, continuing the tension between the characters.

“It was your standard Tom Sawyering: Before lunch one Tuesday, Miles had kneeled in front of his locker and pulled a coin from his pocket.”

This passage refers to The Adventures of Tom Sawyer by Mark Twain. In the story, Huckleberry Finn tricks his friend Tom Sawyer to paint a fence for him. Miles uses the same logic to trick Stuart into switching his superior top locker for Miles’s bottom locker. Miles thinks he has outsmarted Niles, but Niles is one step ahead of him and rigs both lockers.

“He did the trick every Thanksgiving, the only time Barry’s father let Grandpa Jimmy visit.”

Principal Barkin’s brief internal monologue reveals within a flashback that his grandfather was a prankster too and disgraced the family’s character by closing the school. The flashback reveals that Barry loved and respected his grandfather, despite what his family perceived as a character flaw.

“You had to be at school already to be detained.”

When Principal Barkin punishes Miles with detention before and after school, Miles’s internal monologue shows his snarky personality. He reasons that he cannot have detention, a form of the word detain, if he is not even at the school yet. This passage illustrates Miles’s sarcasm which adds humor to the story and aids in his challenging authority figures.

“The Latin word for left is sinistra, like ‘sinister.’ That’s us. The mischief makers.”

Niles sees his role as a prankster as subverting power structures and disrupting the status quo. The tradition of raising one’s right hand to swear an oath, which dates back to the 17th century, signifies a person’s intent to fulfill the requirements of the oath. By switching hands, Niles seeks to subvert the traditional practice.

“In March their tree grew great green leaves, and the clubhouse got walls and a window.”

The more time the boys spend planning the prank, the closer they become. Even though Niles and Miles are building it to serve their prank plan, it still becomes a place where their friendship blooms, just like the blossoming of the tree in spring.

“They were two of a kind, Miles and this raccoon!”

Leaving his home in the middle of the night thrills Miles. He sees a raccoon and feels a kinship with the nocturnal creature. Throughout the entire nighttime caper, Miles feels very animal-like as he skulks and creeps about to accomplish their plan.

“Miles breathed in the heat from their bodies. Their smell, rich and sweet, was in his nose and in his throat.”

At the beginning of the novel, Miles has no interest in cows and is unimpressed with Yawnee Valley’s obsession with the large creatures. However, as they become an integral part of the Terrible Two’s prank plan, he must come in close contact with cows. The author uses sensory imagery to show Miles’s interaction with the cows as he grows in respect for them.

“It looked like his neck held up a screaming bilberry.”

A bilberry is a small, richly dark blueberry. Throughout the narrative, Principal Barkin’s face changes through many shades of red and purple. Finding the school full of cows, forcing him to cancel school turns his face a new shade from the intensity of his outrage.