Bullying is displayed in different forms and to varying degrees and it is stressed that it is a community problem. This book has some great strategies for kids about what they can do if they’re bullied – including telling adults and responding appropriately and shows that the bullies also need help. The three friends – and Cody, under duress – form the Stop the Bully Club in the classroom, to talk about the issue and come up with ways kids can stand up to bullies, ending in a class presentation during which secrets are revealed. Two classmates, Pete and Cody’s past victim Amelia, befriend Brian, helping him deal with Cody’s acts, which range from name-calling to hiding schoolbags to physical threats and actions. When moving to a new school, grade six student Brian becomes the immediate and irrational target of the class bully Cody, who also terrorises Brian’s sister Tara, who is in her first year at school.

Junior novel STOP the Bully was borne from author Karen Tyrrell’s experiences as a bullied child (read the interview at and later as a teacher bullied by a parent. The advice I was given to ‘ignore them – they’ll go away if they don’t get a reaction’ was not only incorrect, but in fact spurred the bullies on to step up their attacks in order to get a response – they do it until they get a reaction when you don’t stand up for yourself. Like the protagonist Brian in Karen Tyrrell’s STOP the Bully, I was the shy, unconfident, head-down new kid, and an easy target to those ‘testing’ me out. I, like many people, was bullied as a child.

Bailey Beats the Blah by Karen Tyrrell