Freak the Mighty

Freak the Mighty was first published in America eleven years ago but this is its first UK publication. Given some of the soppy, derivative American imports dealing with disability and the ‘outsider’, it’s hard to understand why this imaginative story has taken so long to get here.

Two boys form the heart of this story: enormous, seemingly slow Max who was dumped in the ‘special ed’ class when he was very young and has failed to learn anything except how to kick out at others; tiny, confident Kevin who walks with crutches and leg brace and whose brilliant intelligence makes him fierce. Both are used to the two responses which can separate disabled children from their peers; being laughed at and being feared. But when Kevin, (affectionately referred to as ‘Freak’ by his friend) moves into the area, they form a partnership and things begin to change. Max supplies the body and the strength and Freak supplies the brains and the high speed talking. With Freak’s little body on Max’s great shoulders they become ‘Freak the Mighty’ and their adventures begin.

The book has a number of stories, including the terrifying nail-biting episode story of Max’s kidnap by his murderous father. But essentially it’s a book about friendship. A friendship that takes a while to get going but which becomes the kind of loyal, life changing partnership that gives two vulnerable boys a strong, humorous voice against the world. I’m not a reader easily brought to tears, but this one made me cry.

Like Simon Hill’s See Ya Simon, also published in 1993, Philbrick tells us that his book is based on the life of a real disabled child who died. Freak the Mighty also begins with a character recounting the story of his extraordinary friend and ending with his death. A story with this structure could easily become clichéd and stereotyped (and some of the ‘underworld’ characters like the friends of Max’s father are a bit hard to take) but the reader will discover things in this book that aren’t so easy to find: like the way in which Max begins to understand that those ‘learning difficulties’ he’s had for as long as he can remember are as much to do with what has happened to him in his life as any deficit in his brain, and that disabled kids can be as strange, nasty and witty as anyone else.