The Revelation of Saint Bruce

by Tres Seymour

Book Overview

Squeal. Snitch. Rat. Whatever you call it, teens have always regarded the betrayal of peers--by giving incriminating information to the authorities--as the ultimate moral crime. Even dedicated... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0531331091
• ISBN13: 9780531331095
• Release Date: October 1998
• Publisher: Orchard Books (NY)
• Length: 160 Pages
• Weight: 0.60 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.6" x 5.8" x 8.6"
• Age Range: 12 to 17 years
• Grade Range: Grades 7 to 12

Customer Reviews

Living What You Believe.

How is a person to live ethically and keep his or her morals in an unethical world? What about "teenagers"? A lot of people say that they're going to do everything anyway so why try to stop them. Issues like these are what THE REVELATION OF SAINT BRUCE deals with. Bruce Wells is for the most part an ordinary person struggling through adolescence. He gets nervous around girls he likes, he wants to be liked, and he's struggling to find his place in the world. However, Bruce is a little different from everyone else because he has a strong ethical and moral code which he not only believes in, but lives out in his daily life. He gets upset at his best friend, Jack, for taking quarters from a pay phone. Bruce doesn't lie. He doesn't cheat or steal. He lives the life that Christ called him to live. People notice and they start calling him "Saint Bruce".Like most people with strong convictions, Bruce has a group of close friends: Jack, Carrie, Theresa, and Ellis. Ellis is the wild card of the bunch and there always is. Bruce thinks that the group has allowed them to be a part of their lives. What he doesn't realize is that the group is really following him and not vice versa. Bruce has a strong charisma and he doesn't even know it. His friends start calling themselves the "Disciples of Saint Bruce".Anyway, Bruce ends up home sick for a day and while he is gone his friends do some drinking in school. Later they offer to tell him what they did. Bruce asks them not to, but they do anyway. When confronted by a teacher about what he knows, Bruce tells the truth and his four friends end up suspended from school for the rest of the semester. For the next five months Bruce is constantly abused. People stop talking to him. They start pulling practical jokes on him. Some tougher students physically beat him occassionaly. His own sister tells him he was wrong to tell the truth. Hardly any one seems to understand. The semester ends and another one begins and life becomes even more interesting for Bruce.THE REVELATION OF SAINT BRUCE is a great book. It has a great story and raises some very important moral and ethical issues that are relevant not only to those in adolescence, but to adults as well. The book illustrates just how difficult it can be to actually live what you believe. There are some who might say the book isn't very realistic and that a student like Bruce Wells would never exist. This isn't true because I was a student like Bruce Wells and I experienced some of the same things he did in this book. It's not always easy to live what you believe, but it is more than worthwhile.

Hard questions, no clear answers

Bruce Wells is a lost student in a large high school in this book. Bruce has a small group of students that he hangs out with but he doesn't really fit in. He has a strong moral code that none of them understand. In one chapter, Bruce believes that Jack is wrong, when Jack takes quarters from a broken pay phone. The rest of the group envy Jack's luck. Because of Bruce's beliefs, the rest of the kids start calling him Saint Bruce. He struggles with this title but not enough. The others do not realize what is involved in Sainthood. "The Disciples of Saint Bruce" get into trouble and expect Bruce not tell. But it is not in his nature to lie when asked to tell the truth. The "Disciples" suffer dire consequences from Bruce's confession, but so does Bruce. Who is right? Who is wrong? There is no clear cut answer. This is a thought provoking book. Several of the characters have trouble fitting in at school and kids today will relate to this. To make matters fuzzier, faculty members do not help in this story. Most are more concerned about keeping their jobs than helping the students. This book will make kids think which might make some readers uncomfortable.