42 pages • 1 hour read
Jeff KinneyThe Last Straw
Fiction | Novel | Middle Grade | Published in 2009A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Part 2Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 2: “February”
Part 2, Chapter 12 Summary: “Tuesday”
Greg’s mom packs him two fruits instead of his customary cookie snacks. Mom reveals that someone has taken the snacks from the laundry bin, and Greg begins investigating who took the snacks. He sneaks into Rodrick’s room looking for crumbs. When Rodrick comes back to his room, Greg hides in the desk cabinet while Rodrick talks to his friend Ward on the phone. After escaping, Greg tries to think of other ways to acquire snacks. He has run out of money because he spent it all on products like cash-printing machines and hovercrafts advertised in his comic books. He is disappointed to discover that none of the products work.
Part 2, Chapter 13 Summary: “Thursday”
Greg’s report card comes in the mail, and his parents aren’t happy with his poor grades. Greg invites his grandmother to come over for dinner because he knows his dad won’t make a scene with Gramma around. Greg tags along with Gramma to Bingo, hoping to avoid his parents further and potentially win some money. When Greg pretends to have won, the clerks send an old lady to intimidate him.
Part 2, Chapter 14 Summary: “Friday”
Greg has a bad day. He flunks a test, falls asleep in class, and gets detention. He feels jittery from sugar withdrawal and digs up the time capsule he buried with Rowley. He takes back his $3, buys himself a snack, and plays Rowley’s video game.
Part 2, Chapter 15 Summary: “Monday”
Greg feels that he does not belong in detention with the other trouble-making kids. He has to sit in front of Leon Ricket, a bully who flicks his ear and gives him wet willies. While the teacher is turned around, Greg claps his hands together, pretending that Leon hit him. The teacher gives Leon additional detention. Greg worries that he made a mistake antagonizing a bully.
Part 2, Chapter 16 Summary: “Tuesday”
Greg redoubles his efforts to catch the thief stealing the snacks from the laundry room. He hides in the laundry basket and waits. His mom doesn’t notice him and dumps warm laundry on him. Greg gets comfortable and falls asleep. In the middle of the night, he wakes up and finally identifies the thief: Dad.
Part 2, Chapter 17 Summary: “Wednesday”
Greg hopes to confront his dad, but Dad goes to bed early. Greg deduces that his dad is upset since the family has been invited to a party at the Snellas’. Dad particularly dreads the party because the Snellas film all the guests performing silly antics in front of their baby, hoping that the video will make it onto a TV show called America’s Funniest Families.
Part 2, Chapter 18 Summary: “Thursday”
Greg looks forward to the Valentine’s Dance at school. He looks through his clothes for something to wear, but ever since his mom stopped doing his laundry, his clothes are all dirty. He chooses a shirt with a modest jelly stain and hopes that Holly Hills won’t notice it.
Part 2, Chapter 19 Summary: “Valentine’s Day”
All the kids at school have to make Valentine’s Day cards for each other. Greg remembers making an overly romantic card for a girl last year and receiving a disappointing hand-me-down card with someone else’s name crossed out on it. This year, Greg makes cards for his classmates telling them exactly what he thinks of them, negative or positive. He makes a mean card for himself to cover his tracks.
The school holds the dance in the auditorium in the middle of the day since they couldn’t get enough volunteers to hold it at night. The music is juvenile, and nobody wants to dance. The teachers threaten to dock PE grades for anyone who doesn’t dance. Greg tries to sneak out but gets caught and has to start dancing. He comes up with a dance step that uses the minimum amount of movement to still count as dancing, and other kids begin to emulate him. He dances his way over to Holly but gets ambushed by Fregley. Greg misses his chance to talk to Holly and walks home alone in disappointment.
Greg receives a Valentine’s card in the mailbox and feels excited for a moment before discovering that it’s from Rowley.
Part 2 Analysis
In this section of The Last Straw, Greg faces a series of increasingly bad days, setting up the personal dilemmas that will drive much of the novel’s tension. This portion is structured around a small mystery involving the disappearance of sweet snacks, which Greg becomes obsessed with solving. The snack shortage serves as a recurring motif that Greg often uses to deflect from his personal shortcomings. Rather than taking responsibility for his failings, Greg consistently looks for someone or something else to blame, showing his immaturity and his reluctance to confront his own behavior.
The section also highlights Greg’s struggles with parental expectations, highlighting The Trials of Growing Up. He faces difficulties at school and increasing tension with his parents, who expect him to be disciplined and obedient. Yet Greg continually fails to meet these expectations. Rather than taking genuine steps to improve, he again relies on schemes and shortcuts to avoid punishment. He uses his grandmother as a buffer to escape his parents’ reprimands, reinforcing his manipulative, transactional approach to family relationships. Greg’s lack of accountability and refusal to face consequences characterize his immaturity even as he tries to position himself otherwise.
Valentine’s Day introduces a new layer of tension as Greg hopes to impress the girl he likes. After being embarrassed by an overly earnest Valentine’s Day card in a prior year, Greg uses Humor as a Tool to mask his insecurity, writing brutally honest, if humorous, valentines for his classmates. At the Valentine’s Dance, the teachers play overly juvenile music, causing Greg and his classmates to feel misrepresented and uninterested in participating. This scene emphasizes how Greg and his peers exist in a transitional period between childhood and adolescence. Greg contains contradictory impulses that pull him between these two phases of life. On the one hand, he behaves naively and immaturely, falling prey to false advertising and managing his time poorly. On the other hand, he has developed an interest in girls and wants to be seen as capable and mature, even if he doesn’t know how to achieve that.
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