The Fat Boy Chronicles

The Fat Boy Chronicles
The Fat Boy Chronicles is a new novel written by "Lang Buchanan" (Diane Lang and Mike Buchanan) that is recently being composed into a movie.
The Fat Boy Chronicles tells the story of an overweight 14 year old boy named Jimmy Winterpock. His language arts teacher gives his class a journal assignment in which they are to write about their day-to-day lives. At the beginning, Jimmy detests it, but as he progresses in his journal, he begins to find the real value in writing it. In the story, Jimmy meets new friends and makes new rivals and eventually ends up losing the weight, thus becoming a healthier 15 year old as the book starts to come to an end.
About the Authors
Lang Buchanan is a pseudonym that represents co-authors Diane Lang and Michael Buchanan.
Diane Lang and Michael Buchanan are both retired teachers who taught at the same school in Atlanta, Georgia. Buchanan was a creative math and science teacher while Lang was a language arts and drama teacher, an odd pair to say the least. They often worked together teaching their students to solve murder mysteries in novels. They then partnered together to create their first book, "Micah's Child". During a book signing, they met a young man named Doug Henning and his father. Throughout middle school, Doug was very overweight. His peers would make fun of him and exclude him at any time possible. Doug's ninth grade year, he because fed up with all of the bullies and decided to lose weight. The Hennigs requested that Lang and Buchanan unite their writing talents to convert his story into a novel.
Lang Buchanan became the authors of a fictional version of Doug Hennig's story. Jimmy Winterpock was the fictional version of Doug in their novel called The Fat Boy Chronicles.
General Summary
The Book "The Fat Boy Chronicles" is a book about an overweight boy, named Jimmy Winterpock. He has trouble at school and is bullied by many of his fellow peers. His friends include Sable, Paul, Spencer, and Allen. The book goes on through many events such as Paul being addicted to drugs, a murder mystery, Sable cutting herself, and more. Throughout the book Jimmy loses his weight, trying to no longer be given the title of "Fat Boy."
This book was written on request of Robb Thurman and to encourage others to stay headstrong and not to be put down by the thin-obsessed society the world is today.
Major Characters
Jimmy Winterpock is the main character of the story, who is required of his teacher to write in his journal about happenings occurring in his day-to-day life. Most of the story is about his struggles that he faces 'trying to get up.' He's constantly taunted by classmates and, despite his intelligence, tends to be forever deemed as the outcast of the school. One of Jimmy's nicknames is "Piggy".

Sable is a constantly depressed girl who is Jimmy Winterpock's friend. She hangs out with Jimmy, Paul, and Allen everyday at school. One day she had cut herself dangerously deep in an attempt to rid herself of emotional pain; she was then rushed to a hospital so the medics could heal the deep cuts. She has problems at her house because she feels her parents do not pay enough attention to her and give all their attention to her younger brother. Due to this issue, it causes Sable to take violent actions against herself to try to stop the pain she is constantly experiencing.

Paul is another major character of the story and is the rather rebellious friend of Jimmy. After a body was found near his backyard he becomes extremely interested in discovering the murderer and manages to convince Jimmy to join him on his search for the killer. Paul has a challenging life at home; his mother is often intoxicated on alcohol and Paul constantly receives beatings from his father. Aside from those problems Paul is developing some major problems of his own. Paul met Jimmy at the church youth group where they bonded immediately.

Allen is much like Jimmy; an overweight kid just trying to get through his life and attempting to disregard the taunts of his fellow peers. Despite this, his personality does differ slightly from Jimmy and he just doesn't seem to understand how to "be fat". (e.g. he wears over-sized clothes, low hanging pants, etc.) He's a kind boy and tries to get along with everybody but ends up being teased.

Whitney Elliot is one of the more popular girls that Jimmy had a slight crush on. He tries to impress her from time to time and tries to be "accepted" by the elitists existing in the school but she only mocks him in return. While seeking the true potential thought to exist within her, Jimmy only ends up embarrassing himself when he thought that she was truly a good friend and different from the others.
Robb Thurman is among the socially accepted group of the school. He is the high school quarter back and tends to be favored amongst his peers. He constantly makes fun of Jimmy and those similar to him, however Jimmy sees the true person in him after their teacher requests that Jimmy tutor Robb in mathematics. At the end of the story, they become good friends.

Spencer is the high school soccer player that is kind to the Jimmy and his friends. As his popularity status grows rapidly, so does his ego and as time passes he eventually quits hanging out with Jimmy. He makes the JV(Junior Varsity) team. He later plays a prank on Jimmy, and their friendship becomes faded and trust is lost.
Nate Hammer is another one of Jimmy's tormentors who picks on Jimmy and his friends for the duration of the story in a terrible act to appear untouchable and "cool" in the eyes of his classmates. He has a crush on Whitney Elliot and perpetually tries to impress her by taunting peers like Jimmy.
Minor Characters
Mr. Winterpock is Jimmy's dad. He supports Jimmy throughout the book in his struggle to lose weight, and he helps Jimmy make a car out of a mouse trap.

Jessica Winterpock is Jimmy's sister. She is always trying to get Jimmy in trouble. Jimmy used her picture on My space in a failed attempt to catch the murderer. She tends to be very dramatic.
Ms. Pope is the Language Arts teacher who is making Jimmy write a journal in which this story is based on.
Mr. Mackey (Mr.M)is Jimmy's goofy Physical Science teacher who shows the class cool science tricks every now and then.
Mr.L is Jimmy's math teacher who always tells the funny math riddles. The kids play a crude joke on him and end up killing his fish. His room also gets spayed with the fire extinguisher and all of the furniture had gotten flipped over.
Kimberly Taylor is the girl who was believed to be murdered by her boyfriend in the forest behind Paul's house.
Amy Cacaro is the girl that plays a prank on Chad Banron.
Starr is the fake girl that Jimmy and Paul create on My Space to get the killer arrested.
Jeremy is a kid on Jimmy's bus who always cusses at cars and one day he cussed at the wrong car. It was a police officer off duty and the police officer made him get off the bus and tell him his number. Then the officer called his mom and told her what he had done. He got in big trouble and stopped yelling out the windows.
Mrs. Winterpock is Jimmy's mom that feeds Jimmy fast food almost whenever he wants. Later in the story she and Jimmy clean out all the unhealthy food from their house to help them loose weight.
Taffy is Jessica's new golden retriever puppy.Jessica got to name this one because Jimmy named Nanook.
Nanook is Jimmy Winterpock's first dog. She is in her middle age. Jimmy named her.
Paul's Father is aggressively abusive to Paul and his mother.
Paul's Mother is a heavy drinker and gets drunk a lot and is abused by her husband (Paul's Father).
Mr. Connelly is a substitue for Jimmy's class and he gets fed up with Sable's behavior when she cusses at the whole class to defend Jimmy, and he sends her to the principles office.

Main Menu

See Also

Main Menu