History Literature / ManiacMagee

* NoCommunitiesWereHarmed

* AbusiveParents: ZigZagged with Aunt Dot and Uncle Dan. Maniac may have gotten caught up in their hostile relationship, but it's never mentioned if they were abusive to him. After eight years, it's clear to see why Maniac wanted out.

* AbusiveParents: ZigZagged with Aunt Dot and Uncle Dan. Maniac may have gotten caught up in their hostile relationship, but it's never mentioned if they were abusive. After eight years, it's clear to see why Maniac wanted out.
* AdultsAreUseless: Maniac skips town in the middle of a school concert, and the choir director is the only adult there who makes any kind of effort to stop him. It's never mentioned if Maniac's aunt and uncle do so much as notice him running away.
* AllPartOfTheShow: In Maniac's concert, there is a song about Dr. Dolittle talking to animals. Maniac screams at his aunt and uncle to talk to each other even long after the show ends. The audience mistakes for improvising until Maniac runs out.

* ScrewThisImOuttaHere: Maniac tries to get his aunt and uncle to notice him at his school's musical, only to realize that they despise each other too much to care. He abandons the performance and runs away from them for good.

* AdultsAreUseless: Maniac skips town in the middle of a school concert, and the choir director is the only adult there who even tries to stop him. His guardians at the time, Aunt Dot and Uncle Dan, are too deep in their hatred for each other to even notice Maniac running away.
* AllPartOfTheShow: In Maniac's concert, there is a song about Dr. Dolittle talking to animals. In the middle of it, Maniac starts screaming at his aunt and uncle to talk to each other which the audience mistakes for improvising.

%% zce * AllPartOfTheShow: What the audience thinks Maniac's screaming at his aunt and uncle to talk to each other is at first.

* AluminumChristmasTrees:
** Butterscotch Krimpets are made to sound so delicious that many kids reading the book thought they were made up. [[http://www.amazon.com/PACKS-Tastykake-Butterscotch-Krimpets-Tastycakes/dp/B000Z8RZ3M They aren't.]]
** Mars Bar Thompson got his nickname from the candy bar which, at the time the of the book's publication, was still being sold in the United States. It hasn't been sold since the TurnOfTheMillennium, reducing it to this trope since Americans have to be reminded about its existence.

* RuleOfSymbolism: [[spoiler: While staying at the [=McNab=] household, Maniac put up with their [[MenCantKeepHouse filthy habits]] because their living was (relatively) clean place in the house. But after [=McNab=] senior set up a trench made up of concrete blocks in the living room, Maniac [[ScrewThisImOuttaHere leaves]] without a word. He leaves, not necessarily because it's a little dirtier than it was before, but because it's unclean on the ''principle'' of how the concrete trench represents the [=McNab's=] blatant racism and his unbridled hatred.]]

* DarkAndTroubledPast: [[spoiler: Poor Maniac lost his parents at an early age to a horrible car crash. And [[NoAccountingInTaste Aunt and Uncle]] weren't much help when they took him in, despite hating each other too much to give their nephew the time of day.]]

* AdultFear: The protagonist is a young boy without a permanent home, whose only living relatives don't seem to care that he's gone.

* PunnyName: [[SpotOfTea Earl Gray]]son. It's probably unintentional, though.

''Maniac Magee'' is a children's book written by Creator/JerrySpinelli. It features a strange boy named Jeffrey Magee who loses his parents and runs away at age eleven, ending up a year later in Two Mills, a town in Pennsylvania that's divided into two sides: The East End, where all the black families live, and West End, with all the white families. Completely ignorant of how the town works, he meets a girl on the East End named Amanda Beale, from whom he borrows a book.

* AbnormalAllergy: Maniac is allergic to pizza. Ironically, he wins a certificate giving him one free pizza a week for a year.

* AllPartOfTheShow: What the audience thinks Maniac's screaming at his aunt and uncle to talk to each other is at first.

** Strangely enough, Hester and Lester Beale are ''not'' twins, but were given rhyming names.

* AngerBornOfWorry: A sizable portion of how Amanda interacts with Maniac. She loves him like a brother, but he drives her absolutely crazy running off all the time.
* BadLiar: Amanda ''might'' have been able to drag Maniac to the store with her before he saw the graffiti... if it hadn't been so early in the morning that all the stores were closed.
* BadassBookworm: Maniac, again, as well as Amanda Beale.
* BelligerentSexualTension: Amanda and Mars Bar appear to have shades of this, especially apparent towards the end of the book.
* BerserkButton: Do ''not'' mess with Amanda's books.
** Maniac gets a similar button with [[spoiler: Grayson's old baseball glove]].
* BigBrotherMentor: Hester and Lester see Maniac this way. He tries to be one to Piper and Russell, as well.
* BlackAndNerdy: Amanda, to an extent: she loves reading and school.

* NotSoDifferent:
** Both the East End and the West End have loving families (the white Pickwells and the black Beales) and horrible racists (the [=McNab=] family and Old Ragpicker).
** Maniac and Mars Bar grow to become this from an initial animosity.
** Maniac explains the trope to Grayson, who wondered if blacks ate meatloaf or used toothbrushes. It's more from ignorance than anything else given how extreme the racial divide in Two Mills is.

A film adaptation aired on Nicklodeon in 2003, although it was [[LighterAndSofter lighter]] in comparsion with the book.

* DarkAndTroubledPast

** Mars Bar is rarely seen without a candy bar. He earned the name.

* WhamLine: [[spoiler: "Five days later the old man was dead."]]

* NotSoDifferent: Both the East End and the West End have loving families (the white Pickwells and the black Beales) and horrible racists (the [=McNab=] family and Old Ragpicker).

* OnlyKnownByTheirNickname: Mars Bar.

->[[SubvertedRhymeEveryOccasion Kissed a ''bull!'']]
-->- Two Mills jump-rope rhyme

* TheRunaway: Maniac.

** Mars Bar Thompson got his nickname from the candy bar which, at the time the of the book's publication, was still being sold in the United States. It hasn't been sold since the TurnOfTheMillenium, reducing it to this trope since Americans have to be reminded about its existence.

** Mars Bar Thompson got his nickname from the candy bar which, at the time the of the book's publication, was still being sold in the United States. It was pulled about ten years later, which reduced it to this trope since Americans have to be reminded about its existence.

----

''Maniac Magee'' is a young adult book written by Jerry Spinelli. It features a strange boy named Jeffrey Magee who loses his parents and runs away at age eleven, ending up a year later in Two Mills, a town in Pennsylvania that's divided into two sides: The East End, where all the black families live, and West End, with all the white families. Completely ignorant of how the town works, he meets a girl on the East End named Amanda Beale, from whom he borrows a book.

A film adaption aired on Nicklodeon in 2003, although it was [[LighterAndSofter lighter]] in comparsion with the book.

As the days go by, Jeffrey is sighted all over town doing incredible things - stealing football passes from high schoolers in the middle of practice, rescuing a boy from the backyard of the creepiest old man in town, and running - ''running'' - on the steel rail of the train tracks. When he tries to return Amanda's book, he both makes an enemy in "Mars Bar" Thompson, a kid who doesn't like seeing a white boy in his neighborhood, and finds a home with Amanda Beale's family. Months ago by and Jeffrey makes a name for himself as the kid who can untie any knot, who runs like a demon, and who doesn't seem to understand that he looks different. He even earns a nickname: Maniac.