He wears a giraffe hat his father bought at the zoo. On the street, she sees him among the other children, who are walking with their parents. She rushes downstairs to see he has already left. Although she intends to walk him to school, Zinkoff is too eager to leave. On his first day of first grade, Zinkoff gets in trouble-with his mother. He doesn’t notice that he doesn’t win, and neither do the other pups. Who can eat the most cupcakes? Who can burp the loudest? Who can grow tallest? There are winners everywhere, in the backyards, alleys, and playgrounds. In fact they love winning, and they invent different challenges for themselves to compete in. They discover that they like winning more than losing. They race in summer and winter, in rain and snow. They converge on the street and decide to race down the alleys. Referring to the other children as pups, the narrator explains how the neighborhood children, also let loose by their parents, run free like puppies. He turns at the end of the block, and it occurs to him that if he keeps turning he can run forever.

Seeing no one, he laughs and celebrates with himself. He races a white car and looks around for someone to celebrate with. He is old enough now, at the age of six, that there are no more limits or parents to watch over him. After years of being fenced in by his backyard and his mother’s voice, Zinkoff stands on his front steps in the morning sun. The narrator comments that Zinkoff is one of many boys from the working-class town in which the story is set. Then one day, someone says Zinkoff, and you somehow know who the name belongs to. But you don’t think much about him, and don’t even know his name. You may be annoyed that he is having more fun. You may catch a glimpse of him sledding down Halftank Hill with his arms out, screaming his head off. You are neither friends nor enemies with him. You never notice him because he blends into the scenery of the playground and neighborhood. Narrated in the present tense by an unnamed omniscient narrator, Loser opens with the narrator addressing the reader as “you.” The narrator says that you grow up with the novel’s protagonist.

Loser book zinkoff