The Outsiders

by S. E. Hinton

Paperback, 224 pages

English language

Published Jan. 6, 2006 by Speak.

ISBN:: 978-0-14-240733-2
OCLC Number:: 801444785

(63 reviews)

No one ever said life was easy. But Ponyboy is pretty sure that he's got things figured out. He knows that he can count on his brothers, Darry and Sodapop. And he knows that he can count on his friends - true friends who would do anything for him, like Johnny and Two-Bit. And when it comes to the beating up on "greasers" like him and his friends - he knows that he can count on them for trouble. But one night someone takes things too far, and Ponyboy's world is turned upside down...

~from inside flap

65 editions

Jim Brown reviewed The Outsiders 40th Anniversary edition by S. E. Hinton

Stay goild, Ponyboy

No rating

I feel like I read this book in junior high or high school, but I'm not sure. This time around, I read it because I'm going to see the Broadway Musical version soon, and I was struck by the representation's of friendship and intimacy in this book. The boys are affectionate and care for one another (and then they head out for a violent brawl with the Socs). It was also interesting to see how bad language or any references to sex are gestured toward but never actually directly represented/talked about.

Before this reading, didn't realize that Hinton was 16 when she wrote it, which is pretty impressive (and also maybe explains whey the book deals with "vulgar" material the way that it does).

Amber Herbert reviewed The Outsiders 40th Anniversary edition by S. E. Hinton

Review of 'The Outsiders 40th Anniversary edition' on 'Goodreads'

2 stars

I expected more from this modern classic. Even if Hinton wrote it when she was sixteen, that doesn’t discount the issues pertaining to pacing and exposition and the paper-thin characters. It read like a rough draft of a manuscript rather than a complete work. Where I was meant to feel sad or annoyed, I felt nothing. I also couldn’t relate to the greasers. Was I truly supposed to sympathize with them or rationalize their various “rumbles”? Every scene was missing the descriptions and requisite tension, making it read like a screenplay rather than a novel.