by P. J. Hoover
A NOTE FROM P. J. HOOVER
BACK IN HIGH SCHOOL, I WAS FIRST INTRODUCED TO THE Odyssey. I’d always been a fan of mythology, but there was something about this particular story that stuck with me. For me, though, the story was a fun adventure tale with lots of scary monsters. And sure, scary monsters are great, but they aren’t enough to explain a story staying popular for thousands of years.
In 2008, I was at a book festival in Oklahoma. Sitting next to me during the book signings was a friendly, chatty author, and we soon got on the subject of mythology. In addition to talking about our favorite myths, I expressed my fascination with this crazy story I loved, The Odyssey.
“Oh, The Odyssey. It’s a great story,” he said. “But have you ever heard of the poem Ithaka by Constantine P. Cavafy? I think you would love it.”
Of course, I hadn’t heard of the poem. But once I got back to Austin, I quickly looked it up.
And read it.
And printed it out.
And read it again.
And I discovered this layer of The Odyssey that I never knew anything about. I’d been tricked in high school. This wasn’t just a story about monsters. This was a story about a hero facing new challenges, trying to save his men, failing over and over, reaching his lowest point, and still pushing on. It was never about him getting to Ithaka. It was always about the journey and how he changed while on it.
Homer’s Excellent Adventure is the story of my heart. It’s the story of me facing my own challenges, failing many times, and finally succeeding. It’s the story of every kid. It’s the story of all of us.
ADVANCE PRAISE FOR HOMER’S EXCELLENT ADVENTURE
“Homer’s Excellent Adventure is a wonderful retelling of The Odyssey … students will appreciate as they enjoy this cultural icon in an easy read that will have them laughing out loud. And likely begging for ‘more like this one!’”
—Dorcas Hand, AASL Award Committee Chair
“Homer felt like a comic adventure retelling of The Odyssey with lots of action, wit and wisdom thrown in. I read this book in one day because I could NOT put it down.”
—Ginna Hill, Librarian, Fern Bluff Elementary School
“When it comes to Mythology Mash-ups, no one does it quite like P. J. Hoover! Her ability to take a classic and make it her own is beyond amazing! Give this book to your geeks, to your bookworms and to your reluctant readers. It is a sure to be a hit!!”
—Margie Longoria, Texas TAYSHAS Reading List
“Homer’s Excellent Adventure is just what young readers need to get them hooked on the stories of ancient Greece. I loved the idea of getting to know Homer as a character and the novelty of him as a participant in Odysseus’ journeys! Treat yourself to this fun twist on Homer’s classic!”
—Cindi Rockett, Librarian, Trinity High School
“What a fun story! I loved the friendship bond between Homer and Dory. Their travels through history were exciting and informative … I can’t wait to see where their future adventures take us!”
—Jennifer Kirby, Cooper Elementary Librarian
Homer’s Excellent Adventure
Copyright © 2020 by P. J. Hoover
Cover and interior illustrations by Erik McKenney
All rights reserved.
All rights reserved. This book may not be reproduced in any manner whatsoever without express permission of the copyright holder.
For more information, write:
CBAY Books
PO Box 670296
Dallas, TX 75367
Children’s Brains are Yummy Books
Dallas, Texas
www.cbaybooks.blog
Hardcover ISBN: 978-1-944821-86-9
Paperback ISBN: 978-1-944821-87-6
eBook ISBN: 978-1-944821-88-3
Printed in the United States of America
For CPSIA information, go to cbaybooks.blog/cpsia-information
For Kay and Morgan, for listening to the story over and over again.
“Tell me, O muse, of that ingenious hero who travelled far and wide after he had sacked the famous town of Troy.”
— Homer, The Odyssey
UPSIDE DOWN IN THE HANDS OF A GIANT
DON’T MAKE THE GODS ANGRY. I KNOW THIS FROM firsthand experience. Making the gods angry was completely the reason why I was upside down, dangling from the hands of a cyclops with every drop of blood rushing to my brain. Actually, if I had even half a brain, I wouldn’t be in this position in the first place. I’d be back in Ionia, milking cows with Mom. Every twelve-year-old boy’s dream, I know. But it sure beat my current situation.
“You’re not going to be able to start the story there, Homer,” Dory interrupted. “You’re skipping all kinds of stuff.”
I tried to focus on my best friend’s words, but my head still reeled from this secret I’d found out about Dory earlier today. I could never tell anyone. Odysseus would have blown a gasket if he’d found out. But that wasn’t my issue right now. My issue was the cyclops.
Dory dangled next to me. We were totally hosed. From down on the ground, I heard Odysseus and a few of the not-so-smart guys yelling up at us. The smarter ones kept quiet and hid in the dark recesses of the cave.
“Where should I start the story? Back at the horse?” I asked. Not that I was writing any of this down at the moment. I couldn’t reach my scroll or my pen.
“Not back at the horse. That’s not even kind of the beginning.” The look Dory gave me made me sure I was about to get smacked upside my head.
“It is,” I said. “It’s where we met Odysseus.”
Dory’s spikey dark hair shook from side to side, looking a lot like upside-down grass growing from the sky, exposing a neck inked with a tattoo I’d never notice before. Dory covered it quickly with a hand. “Before that. Back in Ionia.”
“Ionia!” I said. “That place was so freaking boring.” Not that I’d mind a little boring right now.
I guess I spoke a little too loudly because the cyclops—Polyphemus was his name—started shaking me. My teeth rattled around in my mouth, and I’m pretty sure my brains were turning to jelly. I watched as my scroll and pen fell from my pockets. I guess I wouldn’t miss them if Polyphemus decided to eat me.
“Boring, maybe,” Dory said. “But it’s where the story starts. And you can’t start a story in the middle.”
“Why not?” I lowered my voice, hoping good old Poly would decide I wasn’t worth any effort and would toss me aside. Maybe he’d nibble on my finger and think I tasted bad.
“Duh,” Dory said. “Because you’ll confuse people. They won’t understand anything about why you’re on the adventure. And if they don’t understand why you’re on the adventure, they won’t care why you’re on the adventure. They’ll stop listening. And that, my friend, is the death of a storyteller.”
“I think I’m already a dead storyteller,” I said as Polyphemus lifted me closer to his gaping mouth. It was so gross. There were pieces of flesh trapped between his brown teeth. And I knew they were fresh, because he’d just eaten a couple of Odysseus’ guys earlier. I don’t know their real names, but one of them we called Spitter since he always used to spit on his food so no one else would touch it.
“Just trust me, Homer,” Dory said. “Start from the beginning.”
The beginning. The end. What did it matter? My death loomed before me.
“Fine,” I said. “From the beginning.”
FROM THE BEGINNING
RIGHT … SO THE STORY … IT STARTS IN IONIA, JUST like Dory said. I sat on my bench in school. It wasn’t a real school. Just a reclaimed barn that used to belong to the royal family but then got re-purposed for the good of the people. It still smelled like a barn, and there we
re smears of pig dung on the wooden walls that I had to scrub every time I got detention.
There I was, struggling through another endless day of boring math and spelling and science. I had no idea why any of this stuff mattered for becoming a soldier, but rules were rules, so I had to be here. I tried to keep my eyes open as our teacher, Elder Pachis, droned on and on about language arts of all things. No subject was more boring. Except maybe history. That was pretty awful, too. Heat poured through the windows, like the gods were testing me to see how much I could stand before falling asleep.
Apparently not much because, as hard as I tried, my eyes would not stay open. I used my fingertips to prop my lids open, but that didn’t work. I pinched myself like fifty times. I counted the wrinkles on Elder Pachis’ face. Halfway through, I lost count, so I started again. But then I couldn’t take it any longer. I finally drifted off. I was having some amazing dream about being the head of the royal guard and living in the palace with piles of fresh fruit and meat cooked to perfection. Music played in the background. Someone walked up and offered to rub my feet.
“Of course,” I said, swaying with the music.
“Of course what?” a voice answered that was way more harsh than seemed right for the dream.
“Of course …” My thoughts slipped away from me. What had I been talking about?
“Homer,” the voice said again.
I struggled to open my eyes, but in the dream, they wouldn’t budge.
“Mmmm …,” I said.
Crack. My hand exploded in pain.
I opened my mouth to scream but stopped myself as the real world returned around me. Elder Pachis hovered over me. He held an ivory ruler in his right hand, which must’ve been what just hit my hand. A quick glance down showed a bright red welt forming.
“Having trouble staying awake, are we?” he cackled.
Ugh, this guy. He had to be the worst teacher in the universe. If he bothered to say anything interesting, maybe I’d have wanted to listen. But come on. For the last hour he’d been explaining story arc. I was confused for most of it since it took me that long to figure out he wasn’t talking about a big boat.
“I wasn’t asleep,” I said, shoving a piece of my shaggy hair out of my face.
The entire class laughed.
“You were snoring,” Demetrios said. He was this snotty rich kid who made fun of my dreams of being a soldier every chance he got. He was like my polar opposite: wavy dark hair, super buff. All the girls fawned all over him. Me? My blond hair always looked like I’d been caught in a hurricane, even though I swear I brushed it, and despite soldier training and working on a farm, I could barely make a muscle.
“And drooling,” Lysandra said, tossing her red hair over her shoulder as she laughed.
Yeah, she was Demetrios’ girlfriend. And fine, I had a huge crush on her since the first day of school, even though she never said more than two words to me at a time. Also, those two words normally made me want to crawl under a bench. Kind of like right now.
“See me after class, Homer,” Elder Pachis said.
I knew what staying after school meant. Aside from scrubbing pig dung off the walls, I’d be tracing on the dirt floor, over and over again, “I will not fall asleep during class.” It only made me want to fall asleep that much more.
“Oooh …,” Demetrios said. “Homer is in trouble.”
I wanted to punch him.
I didn’t because it would upset Mom if she found out. Also, it could get me kicked out of school. And no education meant no being a soldier like my dad. Of course, Mom wouldn’t be too upset about this last part. She didn’t want me to be a soldier, and she refused to let me mention it since that was how Dad had died. Well, she said he was dead. I wasn’t willing to give up on him even though he’d been missing for two years.
Fear of drooling kept me awake for the rest of the day. After everyone else filed out of the smelly school, I shuffled my feet and wandered up to the front of the classroom.
“I’ve given you lots of chances, Homer,” Elder Pachis said.
“Yeah, I was up super late—” I started, ready to defend myself like normal. We went through this every time I got in trouble. Old Man Pachis lectured me. I listened and nodded and then scrubbed the walls and wrote words in the dirt.
“But no more chances,” he said, stopping my words.
I must’ve heard wrong.
“What do you mean, no more chances?” There were always more chances. This had to be at least the twentieth time I’d gotten in trouble.
He waggled his finger and eyebrows in sync. “Well, what I mean is that you don’t get any more chances.”
My heart started pounding. This was not how our conversation went.
“Okay,” I said. “So what, then? You want me to clean better around here this time? You want me to sweep?”
“No. No. No,” Elder Pachis said. “You aren’t listening. I said no more chances. The rules say I can’t give you any more.”
“And …,” I said.
“And that’s it. You’re out of school.”
Out of school? He couldn’t be serious.
“You can’t be serious,” I said.
“I’m completely serious,” Elder Pachis said. He pointed at himself. “Look at this face. Do I look like I’m kidding?”
I looked at his face. It was covered in forty-two wrinkles (as of my earlier count) and reminded me of old sandal leather. It also didn’t look like it was kidding. It actually looked a little sad to be delivering such grim news, almost like Elder Pachis had a heart inside his withered chest.
“But that can’t be it,” I said. At this point, my heart pounded so hard, it was making huge whooshing noises in my ears, like I was in the middle of a giant tunnel with nothing else around.
“It can be,” Elder Pachis said. “It is. I’ve let you off as many times as I’m allowed. School’s over for you.”
I stood there as his words sunk in. The only thing I’d ever wanted in life was to be a soldier like my dad, and that dream was slipping away. And then there was Mom. I was never going to be able to go home again. The idea of facing her, of disappointing her … It was too much. I could almost see her face fall. See the tears slip from her eyes. Here I was, her only son, and I was a huge failure in life. The worst son possible.
“But what about being a soldier?” I said.
Elder Pachis shook his head. “Not without an education.”
“So I’m supposed to go home and work on the farm for the rest of my life?” I could hardly say the words.
“Well …,” Elder Pachis said. “The farm won’t be able to belong to you and your mother anymore. With no adult male in the household and the only son no longer being a valid student, the farm will be repossessed by the state.”
“Repossessed!”
“By the mayor,” Elder Pachis said.
That made it even worse. The mayor was Demetrios’ dad. No way in all the realm of Hades was I going to go groveling to their family. They already treated me and Mom like cow dung, ever since Dad hadn’t come home. Hardly better than slaves.
“But Elder Pachis—”
“Save your excuses,” Elder Pachis said. “It won’t do any good. I can’t do anything else.”
The whole world seemed to collapse around me. It was like watching my life get flushed down a whirlpool. But not just my life. Mom’s life, too. Without our farm, we would have nowhere to go. No relatives. Mom would have to live off the mercy of others forever. I could not let that happen.
“One more chance,” I pleaded. “Please.”
Elder Pachis set his ruler down on his desk and met my eyes. We stood there, face to wrinkled face. I tried to keep my lips from quivering even though every part of me wanted to keep begging him for my future.
“Homer,” he finally said, “why should I give you one more chance?”
I shuffled through my memories, like grains of sand on the beach. There was nothing I could find. No reason I could
come up with that had any merit. I’d hated school. Been the worst of students. But right now, there was nothing I wanted so much as to stay here forever.
“Because I really need it.” I bit my tongue to keep from saying any more. “It means everything to me.”
I could almost see the sun move across the sky as the seconds ticked by. But I couldn’t back down now. This was it. The moment of truth.
“Have you started your assignment yet?” Elder Pachis asked.
“Assignment?” I asked, trying not to cringe as the word came out. But not remembering some assignment wasn’t making me look any better.
“Your semester project,” he said.
“Semester project?” I said, even though I was starting to sound like a parrot. “Which semester project are you talking about specifically?”
Elder Pachis clenched his fists like he was trying to control a lifetime of annoyances that ran through him. I hoped his giant knuckles didn’t pop from the effort. “The one I assigned three days ago.”
I nodded my head even though I had no clue what he was talking about.
He grabbed something off his desk. I swear it hadn’t been there a second before. It was a tightly wound scroll held together by a leather tie. He grasped it between both of his gnarled hands.
“There might be one way we can get around the rules, Homer,” he said. “You know what I need?”
Elder Pachis needed a day at the spa. Some sunscreen. Maybe fifty years off his life. But I bit back my normal witty replies.
“What?” I asked.
He whapped the scroll into his palm. “I need a story.”
“A story?”
“A story.”
“What kind of story?” I asked, hoping he didn’t think I was messing with him because I totally wasn’t. Hadn’t he just been yammering on about stories for the last three hours?
“A story to fill this scroll,” he said. “And I’ll make you a deal. If you can get me that story as your semester project, then I’ll find a way to give you one last chance.”