Peter Brown Hoffmeister Books In Order

Publication Order of Standalone Novels

Publication Order of Non-Fiction Books

Publication Order of Anthologies

Peter Brown Hoffmeister is American author (Young Adult, Literature & Fiction, and Biographies & Memoirs) and rock climber. He is famously known as the author of The Valley, Let Them Be Eaten by Bears, The end Of Boys.

Hoffmeister experienced a troubled childhood, and as a result, he was expelled from three high schools. For short, while he lived in Greyhound bus station, at one point, he was remanded in retrieval and parole program, and finally, he brought the experience of a troublesome teen. His past experienced aided him in creating an Integrated Program that serves teens from all over, regardless of the background taking them into wilderness areas to spelunk, backpack, climb, whitewater raft and orienteer. Hoffmeister is a resident of Eugene, Oregon where he lives with his family (wife and daughters) in Eugene, Oregon.

Hoffmeister books have earned starred reviews from Booklist, Kirkus Review, School Library Journal and Publishers Weekly. His book This is The Part Where You Laugh was a popular pick by School Library Journal and was also earned an American Library Association recognition for the Best Fiction For Young Adults; it was also selected for the VOYA Perfect Tens 2016.

This Is Part Where You Laugh

This Is Where You Laugh kicks off by introducing, Travis, who is freeing out the two crocodiles he bought earlier from, Chevron station, into a lake near the northern part of Eugene Neighborhood.

The novel is a narration of Hoffmeister life. When he was a teen he used to be very stubborn, he narrates how he had to be expelled from three schools that made him relocate to South Eugene from North Eugene. He had to be placed in a security forum “life challenge program” in East Texas, where he met an individual English teacher who helped him to change his life to be a teacher.

The novel focuses on challenges facing teens such as homelessness, violence, addiction, and racism. These teens are given hopes of a better life through their daily struggles. Hoffmeister develops his story using the first person perspective. His style of writing holds on crucial information and in the long run, leaves the reader in a state of great suspense. Travis, the protagonist, makes his voice all over the novel with sentences that grasp the reader’s attention.

The character in This Is Part Where You Laugh, are developed with many complexities. For example Natalia the girl across, Travis’s poor mom, his best friend creature and his grandparents in their mobile home. Travis is seen to be struggling very hard to be a good boy he wants to be, though he fails most of the time, his effort is evident. He finds it very difficult to read books, but there is a part that makes his books enjoyable. Specifically, the book he read about compassion that trained him on the hearing perspective. He goes ahead and lay out his feelings.

The End of Boys

Hoffmeister was a nervous child who often ran away from home, and school. He was homeschooled until he was 14. He had to deal with his parents and siblings on a daily basis even though this was an uphill task to him. Through the years, Hoffmeister watched his mother drown into her form of mania while on the other hand his father- a doctor and a scholar often pushed the poor boy particularly hard.

He wanted the best for his son, but this process only taught Hoffmeister to always expect the worst especially from his father. In the midst of this chaotic home life, Hoffmeister began to hear a calling, and when the time finally came to join a public school, he was finally free from the controlling nature of his father.

The End of Boys portrays the middle-class family, where the father of the house is a doctor (Neonatologist) and the family religiously profoundly rooted. The children are brought up by a sickly mother who is ailing from bipolarity until the age of high school. They start detaching themselves from their mother once in high school. She at most time enveloped a negative attitude and began to neglect her children, threatening suicide in front of her children and much more. On the other hand, the father is reported to be an authentic man but only wants the best for his children.

The End of Boys follows Hoffmeister narration of his life in a harrowing account of the trauma of coming of age. The author father was a famous Neonatologist; his family life was a typical one, religiously active in both church and community. However, Hoffmeister father has authoritative issues. He was the type of man who could punch and break his son’s nose during a game of touch football, not by anger or accident but simply because he thought it was funny. He is a type of dad who would take parents pressure to extreme levels, always giving his son a bitter and forceful verbal attack each night before going to sleep.

The author’s father would always attend his son’s sporting events even during practices often getting in the coaches way and also embarrassing his son for not being tough enough in the field. In other words, he was like a parent from hell, continually forcing his son to mow the lawn even when sick. He was not a sensitive type of dad. The author also narrates of the parents who would force their kids to smoke cigarette starting at age 5-7 until they threw up so that they would not be tempted to smoke during their later years.

The tension in his family becomes even more severe as the author moves out during his second year of high school. The novel vividly details these years engagingly and compellingly. The End of Boys is an accurate depiction of Hoffmeister’s remarkable writing style. From high school, the author goes ahead to advance his studies and later graduate with a Masters Degree in English and goes back to teach at the same school that he was expelled from. On the other hand, his brother becomes a famous snowboarder and their family experience a degree of healing.