{"id":1185,"date":"2015-08-13T15:34:15","date_gmt":"2015-08-13T19:34:15","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blinkyabooks.com\/?p=1185"},"modified":"2026-01-02T08:18:50","modified_gmt":"2026-01-02T08:18:50","slug":"the-looney-experiment","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/staging.harpercollinsfocus.hcusweb.com\/blinkyabooks\/the-looney-experiment\/","title":{"rendered":"The Looney Experiment"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Dear Blink Readers,<\/p>\n<p>On my first day of fifth grade, I sat still and wondered as my new teacher, Mr. Looney, climbed on top of his desk chair while wielding our spelling textbook in one hand.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cYou are all\u00a0familiar with the school\u2019s spelling textbook program, yes?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>We all nodded glumly. We were used to doing endless worksheets from this spelling book series.<\/p>\n<p>Then Mr. Looney shocked us. While still on his chair, he tossed the textbook across the room and into the garbage. \u201cThis year will be a little different,\u201d he said with a wonderfully warm and wise smile.<\/p>\n<p>Instead of doing endless textbook exercises, we wrote in Mr. Looney\u2019s self-designed FLAIR program. We wrote and wrote and wrote.<\/p>\n<p>As a seventh-grade teacher myself now, I continue to be a big believer in \u201cdoing\u201d education differently.<\/p>\n<p>And as a writer, I am a big believer in creating stories that show different avenues of living\u2014stories that make us laugh, wonder, and hope that there are more ways to be ourselves than the scant options we sometimes feel are offered.<\/p>\n<p>Thus, <em><a href=\"http:\/\/blinkyabooks.com\/books\/the-looney-experiment\/\">The Looney Experiment<\/a><\/em>. This novel follows eighth-grader\u00a0Atticus Hobart as he struggles to overcome his fear of speaking in class, as he tries to deal with a bully who calls him \u201cAtticus Fatticus,\u201d as his parents are separating, and as he learns from a long-term, older-than-dirt substitute teacher named Mr. Looney.<\/p>\n<p>Atticus\u2019s journey is both hilarious and heartening. He must figure out how to use his own voice, and in the process he discovers that living only in his imagination isn\u2019t nearly as powerful as courageously trying to make his imagination reality.<\/p>\n<p>I wrote this novel with all my heart and mind and soul, and my hope is that, through it, readers will laugh deeply, wonder wildly, and find the courage inside their own hearts.<\/p>\n<p>\u2014Luke Reynolds<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/blinkyabooks.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Looney.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-1195\" src=\"http:\/\/blinkyabooks.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Looney-195x300.jpg\" alt=\"Looney\" width=\"195\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"https:\/\/staging.harpercollinsfocus.hcusweb.com\/blinkyabooks\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/Looney-195x300.jpg 195w, https:\/\/staging.harpercollinsfocus.hcusweb.com\/blinkyabooks\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/6\/2015\/08\/Looney.jpg 307w\" sizes=\"auto, (max-width: 195px) 100vw, 195px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Dear Blink Readers, On my first day of fifth grade, I sat still and wondered as my new teacher, Mr. Looney, climbed on top of his desk chair while wielding our spelling textbook in one hand. \u201cYou are all\u00a0familiar with the school\u2019s spelling textbook program, yes?\u201d We all nodded glumly. We were used to doing [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news-notes"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v27.5 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/product\/yoast-seo-wordpress\/ -->\n<title>The Looney Experiment - Blink YA Books<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/staging.harpercollinsfocus.hcusweb.com\/blinkyabooks\/the-looney-experiment\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"The Looney Experiment - Blink YA Books\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"Dear Blink Readers, On my first day of fifth grade, I sat still and wondered as my new teacher, Mr. Looney, climbed on top of his desk chair while wielding our spelling textbook in one hand. \u201cYou are all\u00a0familiar with the school\u2019s spelling textbook program, yes?\u201d We all nodded glumly. We were used to doing [&hellip;]\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/staging.harpercollinsfocus.hcusweb.com\/blinkyabooks\/the-looney-experiment\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"Blink YA Books\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2015-08-13T19:34:15+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:modified_time\" content=\"2026-01-02T08:18:50+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"http:\/\/blinkyabooks.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/08\/Looney-195x300.jpg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"harper-horizon\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"harper-horizon\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"2 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\\\/\\\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/staging.harpercollinsfocus.hcusweb.com\\\/blinkyabooks\\\/the-looney-experiment\\\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/staging.harpercollinsfocus.hcusweb.com\\\/blinkyabooks\\\/the-looney-experiment\\\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"harper-horizon\",\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/staging.harpercollinsfocus.hcusweb.com\\\/blinkyabooks\\\/#\\\/schema\\\/person\\\/19a8d7d3fcab0feafa6b075c5a1e2c65\"},\"headline\":\"The Looney Experiment\",\"datePublished\":\"2015-08-13T19:34:15+00:00\",\"dateModified\":\"2026-01-02T08:18:50+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/staging.harpercollinsfocus.hcusweb.com\\\/blinkyabooks\\\/the-looney-experiment\\\/\"},\"wordCount\":315,\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\\\/\\\/staging.harpercollinsfocus.hcusweb.com\\\/blinkyabooks\\\/the-looney-experiment\\\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"http:\\\/\\\/blinkyabooks.com\\\/wp-content\\\/uploads\\\/2015\\\/08\\\/Looney-195x300.jpg\",\"articleSection\":[\"News &amp; 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