Book Review: The Chocolate War

A young man in a private school gets caught up in school politics that concerns school teachers and school gang leaders. His refusal to sell chocolate bars makes him both hero and bum. It also makes him a target.

Robert Cormier’s message is not a happy one, but it is realistic in terms of what some high school students have experienced. Cormier is noted for this story as it begins a period of Realism in Young Adult Literature.

Unfortunately, Cormier puts every nasty school incident possible in the story, and it becomes a question whether or not it is a realistic portrayal of one individual’s school experience.

Jerry Renault is a young man with a good philosophy of life. As a high school freshman, he keeps in his locker a poster with a very important message: “Do I dare disturb the Universe?”

This young man thinks for himself about what is happening at school around him, and while he is unable to escape the secret society “The Vigils,” he still decides his own fate when it comes to the chocolate sale. He refuses to sell the chocolates and is first hero, then motivator to some students.

But when that goes against the desires of both the Vigils, and those who run the school, he experiences humiliation in many forms: on the football field, in the classroom, at home. He is shunned, stalked, beaten up, and actually labeled queer. Cormier says the worst thing you can call…