Alan Mendelsohn, the boy from Mars
Alan is a white chocolate macadamia nut cookie. He's a nice boy, but does the most random things. What do you expect from a Martian? And one created by Daniel Pinkwater, at that.
I wish I could be as cool as Alan Mendelsohn. It's hard to have Daniel Pinkwater characters as role-models, though. They're just so wacked. For example, Bentley Saunders Harrison Matthews III. Also known as Rat. I always wanted her hi-fi, but how many of us have mad scientest uncles? Ok, enough. I'm sorry, I'll shut up now.
There's no pictures of the elusive Mars-boy, so you get to read Leonard Neeble's first impressions.
Chapter 5
"Some school. You could cast a horror movie with some of the kids around here." Somebody was talking to me. I was sitting on my favorite bench at the far end of the lunch court. There wasn't anybody near me except this kid I'd never seen before. He had a beard! I don't mean a real beard like a hippie--but he had a heavy stubble like a grown man. He was wearing a green sweater with three yellow stripes around one arm and a big yellow letter K on the pocket. It was one of these sweaters that button down the front.
"Are you talking to me?" I asked. Nobody had talked to me in weeks.
"Yeah, how can you stand this place? Everybody is so snotty and stupid. --By the way, my name is Alan Mendelsohn."
"Leonard Neeble," I said.
"Glad to meet you, Leonard," Alan Mendelsohn said. I noticed he was wearing black-and-white saddle shoes. I had never seen a real kid wearing those. --I only knew about them from old movies. He also had these weird plaid socks. I could see that Alan Mendelsohn wasn't going to fit in at Bat Masterson Junior High School. In his way, he was as outlandish-looking as I was.