Stuntboy, in the Meantime

Written by Jason Reynolds

Narrated by Guy Lockard, Nile Bullock, Angel Pean and 6 more

WINNER OF THE 2023 AUDIE AWARD FOR MIDDLE GRADE!
NAMED A 2023 ALA NOTABLE CHILDREN’S RECORDING!

An Odyssey Children’s Award winner
A Schneider Family Award Honor Book for Middle Grade

From Newbery Medal honoree and #1 New York Times bestselling author Jason Reynolds comes a hilarious, hopeful, and action-packed middle grade novel about the greatest young superhero you’ve never heard of, filled with illustrations by Raúl the Third!

Portico Reeves’s superpower is making sure all the other superheroes—like his parents and two best friends—stay super. And safe. Super safe. And he does this all in secret. No one in his civilian life knows he’s actually…Stuntboy!

But his regular Portico identity is pretty cool, too. He lives in the biggest house on the block, maybe in the whole city, which basically makes it a castle. His mom calls where they live an apartment building. But a building with fifty doors just in the hallways is definitely a castle. And behind those fifty doors live a bunch of different people who Stuntboy saves all the time. In fact, he’s the only reason the cat, New Name Every Day, has nine lives.

All this is swell except for Portico’s other secret, his not-so-super secret. His parents are fighting all the time. They’re trying to hide it by repeatedly telling Portico to go check on a neighbor “in the meantime.” But Portico knows “meantime” means his parents are heading into the Mean Time which means they’re about to get into it, and well, Portico’s superhero responsibility is to save them, too—as soon as he figures out how.

Only, all these secrets give Portico the worry wiggles, the frets, which his mom calls anxiety. Plus, like all superheroes, Portico has an arch-nemesis who is determined to prove that there is nothing super about Portico at all.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Simon & Schuster Audio
• Release date: Nov 30, 2021
• ISBN: 9781508246237

Jason Reynolds

Jason Reynolds is a #1 New York Times bestselling author, recipient of the MacArthur Genius Grant, a Newbery Award Honoree, a Printz Award Honoree, a two-time National Book Award finalist, a 2024 MacArthur Fellow, a Kirkus Award winner, a UK Carnegie Medal winner, a two-time Walter Dean Myers Award winner, an NAACP Image Award Winner, an Odyssey Award Winner and two-time honoree, and the recipient of multiple Coretta Scott King honors, a Coretta Scott King Author Award, and the Margaret A. Edwards Award. He was also the 2020–2022 National Ambassador for Young People’s Literature. His many books include All American Boys (cowritten with Brendan Kiely); When I Was the Greatest; The Boy in the Black Suit; Stamped; As Brave as You; For Every One; the Track series (Ghost, Patina, Sunny, Lu, and Coach); Look Both Ways; Stuntboy, in the Meantime; Stuntboy, In-Between Time; Miles Morales Suspended; Ain’t Burned All the Bright (recipient of the Caldecott Honor) and My Name Is Jason. Mine Too. (both cowritten with Jason Griffin); Twenty-Four Seconds from Now...; and Long Way Down, which received a Newbery Honor, a Printz Honor, and a Coretta Scott King Honor. His debut picture book, There Was a Party for Langston, won a Caldecott Honor and a Coretta Scott King Illustrator Honor. He lives in Washington, DC. You can find his ramblings at JasonWritesBooks.com.

Reviews for Stuntboy, in the Meantime

[Meg Rice · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

I can't recall a time when I've enjoyed an audiobook as much as I delighted in this one. I've read most of Jason Reynold's books and respect and appreciate his writing honestly about hard topics concerning growing up and life in general. However, this audio-recording is a real gem; so entertaining with sound effects and delightfully wild voices. It was like watching a movie with eyes closed as the action and soundtrack unfolded. LOVED IT!

Portico Reeves lives with parents in a constant state of disagreement, who doesn't realize that soon having two apartments means that when all the possessions are divided up, his parents will disagree about who he should live with. His ability to cope by living with an alter-ego, "Stuntboy," can't protect him when he finally understands the new reality for his family.

Jason Reynolds has the ability to let us see other characters and all the action through Portico's eyes which makes the writing so much richer than it would be with an objective storyteller. Reynolds also leaves us waiting and wanting more at the end with, "TO BE CONTINUED."

[Camille Jones · Rating: 5 out of 5 stars]

This audiobook won the Audie in 2023 in the Best Middle Grade category. The performances in this audiobook are so stellar, I don't know how more people aren't talking about it.