How to Win at High School (30 page)

So, there it is.

First day of school and Adam walks into Massey and knows literally nobody. Some of the kids know Pizza Man—

(word gets around)

—but he's not the guy they think he is, not anymore. He's no legend. He's no rainmaker. He's certainly not a
god.

He's just Adam Higgs now.

He's kind of a loser again.

And he's okay with it.

I wrote the first draft of this book a little more than twelve years ago. It was the first novel I ever wrote. It was awful. The fact that you're holding it in your hands right now is a testament to the courage and fortitude of my teachers, both at Kennedy Collegiate and Riverside Secondary in Windsor, Ontario, and at the Universities of Guelph and British Columbia.

It's also a testament to my wonderful agent, Stacia Decker at the Donald Maass Agency, and my fantastic editor, Kristen Pettit at HarperTeen, whose insights and enthusiasm turned the forgotten scribblings of some misguided emo kid into one kick-ass book.

I owe a ton of thanks to everyone at HarperTeen, too, especially Elizabeth Lynch and the copyeditors and proofreaders who saved me from public embarrassment on many an occasion. Any embarrassment that remains is mine to bear, and mine alone.

Thanks to my friends, especially Maciejka Gorzelnik and Shannon Kyla, for story consultation, fact-finding, and general inspiration.

And thanks to my family, whose love and support carried me through my wayward youth, and imbued in me the courage to follow my dreams. Mom, Dad, Andrew, and Terry, I love you all.

P.S. Readers familiar with Don Winslow's work will probably notice that this book owes a lot stylistically to his novels
Savages
and
Kings of Cool
, both of which are incredible, and which revolutionized the way I looked at this story. If you haven't read them, you have homework tonight.

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OWEN MATTHEWS
was raised on rap music and violent video games. He is a graduate of the University of British Columbia's creative writing program, has worked on fishing boats and in casinos all over the world, and currently writes critically acclaimed crime thrillers under a secret identity. A fan of fast cars and sugary breakfast cereals, Matthews lives in Vancouver, Canada.

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Cover art © 2015 by Getty Images / J.P. Nodier

Hand lettering by Jessie Sayward Bright

Cover design by Sarah Nichole Kaufman

HarperTeen is an imprint of HarperCollins Publishers.

HOW TO WIN AT HIGH SCHOOL
. Copyright © 2015 by Owen Laukkanen. All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the nonexclusive, nontransferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse-engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins e-books.

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