Tolog Review: King Dork

King Dork
by Frank Portman 
reviewed by Zhou Fang

According to Google, the definition of dork is “a dull, slow-witted, or socially inept person.” Tom Henderson, the main character in the book, calls himself king dork to be ironic about how others see him. In fact, he is not silly at all but pretty smart.

King Dork by Frank Portman tells the story of Tom Henderson and his only and best friend Sam Hellerman trying to survive their sophomore year in high school. The book shows us readers the real life of public high school. At some point I was shocked because it involves bullying, partying, drugs and sexual topics. 

When I first saw the book, I was attracted by its title because my roommate once said that I was kind of dorky. I found myself constantly reading once I opened the book. Tom is such a brilliant boy and I am totally attracted by his intelligence, rigorous logic and extraordinary sense of humor.

An important lead of King Dork is Catcher In The Rye. Catcher has a strong influence on Tom because it really speaks to him and Tom finds a lot of common things between Holden and himself. Tom learns about his father’s thoughts when he was young from his father’s books. King Dork to me is just like Catcher to Tom. It offers me information about what is the real life in public high school like.

As a student in a private high school, I am a fortunate one that stands away from bullying. I feel sorry and angry when people bully Tom and Sam, physically and verbally. In this way the author tries to drag people’s attention to peer pressure and bullying. Although it annoys me that nobody, not even Tom and Sam, stand up to fight against bullying, I am surprised and glad to see that they can shake it off easily by joking each other instead of getting depressed. Maybe Frank Portman is trying to tell us that we do not need to care too much about others’ words all the time. We should be proud to be ourselves, just like Tom and Sam. 

The plot of King Dork is catchy and unpredictable. If you want to know the surprising ending, why not read King Dork and find out yourself? I guarantee that you will have a lot of fun with this amazing book!