Hoot

Hoot, by Carl Hiaasen, is a humorous adventure novel for middle-grade readers in which a group of children tries to save the habitat of a colony of owls from being bulldozed. Published in 2002, the book became a New York Times bestseller, won a Newbery Medal, and has been made into a motion picture.

Author Hiaasen is an award-winning journalist and columnist for the Miami Herald. He has written nearly three dozen books, including six non-fiction works and six novels for young readers. Twenty of his books have made bestseller lists. Hiaasen’s stories tend to focus on environmental problems and the political corruption that makes those problems worse.

Hoot was reprinted in 2020; the ebook version of that edition is the basis for this study guide.

Plot Summary

Riding the bus to school in the southern Florida town of Coconut Cove, new student Roy Eberhardt sees a boy running barefoot alongside the bus. At the next stop, the boy continues running and heads off through the town. Roy wonders who he is. A few days later, Roy again sees the boy. He chases after the boy, who leads him across a golf course, where Roy gets hit by a golf ball.