Hit Squad

Dave Jenkinson is a professor in the Faculty of Education at the University of Manitoba and the author of the “Portraits” section of Emergency Librarian.

Containing echoes of S.E. Hinton’s The Outsiders, Heneghan’s Hit
Squad is an excellent example of the hi-lo genre. Despite the genre’s
length constraints, Heneghan has created an engaging and believable plot
populated by a cast of characters who are more fully developed than most
in hi-lo books.

In Hinton terms, ninth grader Mickey Cord, a foster child living in
Vancouver’s Creekside area, is a Greaser, while Birgit Neilsen, also
in Grade 9 and from the affluent Grandview district, is a Soc. Relaxed
school boundaries allow Mickey and other Creeksiders to attend the
“better” Grandview High, but the infusion of Creeksiders has led to
tensions between the socioeconomic groups. After Birgit is physically
assaulted by three Creekside girls, she decides that the students must
regain control of the school from the “low-class bullies.” To that
end, Birgit creates the secret Hit Squad, which consists of herself and
three tough football team members, one of them Mickey, the only
Creeksider and himself a victim of school bullies. Smitten by Birgit’s
beauty and perceiving her as his entree to the Grandview in-group,
Mickey joins them in their first successful hit, roughing up Birgit’s
attackers. Their next prey are two racist toughs who beat a black
student, but, because the pair are stronger than the Hit Squad’s
initial targets, Mickey recruits Heck (aka Hulk), a muscular but
mentally challenged young man from his group home. During the Hit
Squad’s pursuit of their quarry, Heck is accidentally killed, and, as
a result of his death, Mickey realizes that his values had become
misplaced. Highly recommended.