Gr 4-7-Stanley Yelnats is an unusual hero-dogged by bad luck stemming from an ancient family curse, overweight, and unlikely to stick up for himself when challenged by the class bully. Perpetually in the wrong place at the wrong time, Stanley is unfairly sentenced to months of detention at Camp Green Lake (a gross misnomer if ever there was one!) where he's forced to dig one hole in the rock-hard desert soil every day. The …showed first 75 words of 426 total…

…showed last 75 words of 426 total…as Caveman) finds doesn't qualify, but a gold-colored tube with the initials KB does. With each hole he digs, Stanely comes closer to the truth that KB stands for Kissin' Kate Barlow, a schoolteacher whose forbidden love for an onion seller turned her into a notorious outlaw who roamed the area back when there was a lake in Green Lake. And that story about Stanley's no-good-dirty-rotten-pig-stealing-great-great-grandfather? It might not be a different story after all.