83 pages • 2 hours read
Gordon KormanNo More Dead Dogs
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2000A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.
Chapters 6-8Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Chapter 6 Summary
After the team loses a second game, a couple of Wallace’s football teammates, Rick and Feather, write book reviews for Wallace to give Mr. Fogelman. They’re convinced having Wallace back on the team will make them win. Wallace refuses both, saying his presence doesn’t do anything for the team. His friends argue that even Cavanaugh said having Wallace back would help, which makes Wallace suspicious.
Wallace visits Cavanaugh to demand an explanation. In a too-pleasant voice, Cavanaugh tells Wallace to relax because their school has bigger problems—like whoever keeps vandalizing the play. Cavanaugh states the vandal is likely someone who “doesn’t like Old Shep, My Pal, has a grudge against Mr. Fogelman, and spends a lot of time in the gym” (50). Enraged because Cavanaugh’s spreading the idea that Wallace is behind the vandalism, Wallace slips extra weights onto Cavanaugh’s bench press and then leaves.
After school on Monday, Trudi shows Wallace a survey she took of the drama kids. Most of them believe he committed the vandalism, but many don’t care because Wallace’s dialogue suggestions have made the play so much better. Wallace doesn’t understand why the kids are so grateful when he’s doing something so easy, and he thinks that if Zack Paris had done what Wallace did, then “Old Shep, My Pal wouldn’t be such a lousy book” (52).
Chapter 7 Summary
Rachel writes another letter to Julia Roberts, this time explaining that Wallace is responsible for the vandalism, and she says that he’s using his dialogue suggestions to take over the play. Trudi argues that’s the dumbest thing she’s ever heard, but Rachel refuses to bend. When she goes to Broadway with her family to see a play, her brother and dad talk about how cool Wallace is, ruining Rachel’s night.
One day at rehearsal, Wallace and Mr. Fogelman argue about a lengthy monologue and the lack of action in the play. Rachel gets angrier and angrier at Wallace until she demands to see “what kind of writing talent a person gets from diving on a football” (57). Shocked, Wallace gives in, but the rest of the kids agree with his assessment. They want to add in the opening scene where Old Shep is hit by a motorcycle, but Mr. Fogelman refuses, saying anyone who disagrees is welcome to drop out of the show. Rachel is on Mr. Fogelman’s side because she believes the director of a play is in charge, comparing him to the president. Trudi disagrees, saying that “if you don’t like the president, you can vote him out of office” (61).
Chapter 8 Summary
Chapter 8 is told from Mr. Fogelman’s perspective. He leaves memos for himself throughout the chapter. The first is to meet with the football coach, who advises Mr. Fogelman not to get his hopes up that Wallace will cooperate. Next, he reminds himself to be strong but finds this difficult, especially when Trudi states that Wallace is turning “a typical yawn of a school play into something awesome” and when the set designer stops caring about the backdrop art (64). Next, he tries to reason with the kids, can’t, and realizes he isn’t going to easily win this battle.
One day at rehearsal, one of the kids notices a jump rope hanging in front of the scenery board. He pulls on it and a bucket full of pepper falls, spilling its contents and forcing everyone into coughing fits. One of the kids is so disoriented that he steps backward off the stage. Wallace catches him, and the entire cast breaks into applause. Fogelman realizes what’s missing from the play at that moment: “the kind of enthusiasm that couldn’t be manufactured” (68). His final memo is a note to harness that enthusiasm, and he agrees to let the cast try out Wallace’s idea for the dog’s death scene.
Chapters 6-8 Analysis
Throughout the book, Wallace is sure someone on the football team is responsible for the attacks on the play. Cavanaugh is his primary suspect, and Cavanaugh’s behavior and dialogue in Chapter 6 is a red herring. Cavanaugh dislikes Wallace because he feels Wallace stole his glory during the previous football season. Cavanaugh has nothing against the play, but his attitude and theory about the type of person who’d attack the play make it sound like he has it out for Wallace and the show. By his own criteria, though, he can’t be the attacker. He doesn’t care about Old Shep, My Pal, doesn’t have a grudge against Mr. Fogelman, and doesn’t spend a lot of time in the gym. Wallace is too angry at the attacks and at Cavanaugh to see this logic and so continues to blame Cavanaugh.
The cast’s loyalties start to shift in Chapters 7 and 8. Wallace has made more and more suggestions about the play, and the kids, who were already discontented with the play, want to be part of something better. They argue in favor of Wallace’s suggestions, which makes Mr. Fogelman feel like he’s losing control. The pepper scene shows the most important thing in any team effort—widespread enthusiasm.
Korman shifts to Mr. Fogelman’s perspective to reveal the character growth that’s slowly affecting the first conflict in the novel: Wallace versus Mr. Fogelman. Mr. Fogelman starts to realize that it doesn’t matter who’s in charge as long as energy is high, and the final product is good. His willingness to go along with Wallace’s suggestions for the sake of the play proves his development, even if he isn’t consciously aware of it yet.
The final boundaries between the “theater kids” and Wallace are beginning to dissolve in this section, as Wallace displays some heroism for the sake of one theater kid who falls of the stage, and Wallace also proves his writing skill with his improvement suggestions. These details foreshadow Wallace’s later assertion that the theater kids are more his friends than his former football team.
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