Paul Zindel's first Young Adult book THE PIGMAN is the story of two high school sophomores, John Conlan and Lorraine Jensen, and a lonely old man with an awful secret. A telephone game puts them in touch with Mr. Angelo Pignati, who becomes know as the Pigman. When they are invited to his house, they find he collects statues of pigs. They feel sorry for the old man, who is evidently lonely, so they go with him to the zoo. Here the Pigman introduces them to Bobo, the ugliest, most vicious baboon the kids have ever seen. They also spend time with him in his home, rationalizing that they are relieving a lonely old man's boredom.

The two teens find out Mr. Pignati's secret and help him when he has a heart attack. When he returns home, he finds that John and Lorraine's friends have destroyed his pig collection during a party, and he banishes them from his house. When Mr. Pignati tragically drops dead after learning that Bobo has died, John and Lorraine discover that they had trespassed on the old man's life and, when he died, something in them died as well. "There was no place to hide, their lives would be what they made of it, nothing more, nothing less, a way out of emptiness."

John sums up the era they are living in when he says, "I want to go to acting school right after graduation...I just don't want to wear a suit every day and carry an attaché case and ride a subway. I want to be me. Just me. Not a phony in a crowd. For those young people whose parents were teenagers in the 1960s and 1970s, this is a glimpse into their lives.

   --- Reviewed by Audrey Marie Danielson

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