I Am the Cheese

I Am the Cheese is a suspenseful mystery novel published by the American novelist and journalist Robert Cormier in 1977. A longtime resident of the Northeast, Cormier centers his story on a teen boy, Adam Farmer, who believes he is biking from his Massachusetts hometown to a hospital in Vermont to visit his dad—a journalist who risked his life to testify against massive wrongdoing in government. In fact, Adam has been committed to a psychiatric hospital. The story centers on the themes of Persistence on Journeys, Constant Threats and Fears, and Constructing and Manipulating Identity. It became a film in 1983, and, along with The Chocolate War (1974), it remains one of Cormier’s most esteemed novels.

Other works by this author include We All Fall Down, The Bumblebee Flies Anyway, Tunes for Bears to Dance To, and The Rag and Bone Shop.

This guide refers to the 1977 Pantheon Books edition. Citations given are for page numbers in this edition.

This guide numbers the novel’s chapters to enable reference although these are unnumbered by Cormier.

Content Warning: I Am the Cheese makes reference to violence, threat and murder, and to potential psychological abuse and incarceration.