Fifteen-year-old Felton Reinstein hits puberty and transforms from a nerd to an athlete but struggles to cope with his mom’s growing mental health struggles in Geoff Herbach’s young adult novel, Stupid Fast (2011). Bullied and teased most of his young life, Felton has anxiety caused by his dad’s death by suicide. Now, he grows huge and fast, joins the football team, and gains new jock friends and a smart, talented girlfriend named Aleah. Outwardly things are great, but at home, Felton’s mom’s actions take an emotional toll on Felton and his brother Andrew, until they have no choice but to face the situation.

Content Warning: Stupid Fast contains content concerning suicide and may be emotionally challenging and cause discomfort or distress for some readers. Additionally, the novel uses racially charged language, as well as stigmatizing language around mental health . This guide places the author’s use of these terms in quotation marks.

Stupid Fast was an American Library Association Best Fiction for Young Adults and Young Adult Library Service Association Best Fiction for Young Adults selection, a Junior Library Guild selection, and winner of the 2011 Cybils (Children’s and Young Adult Bloggers’ Literary) Award. Pagination in this guide refers to the Sourcebooks Fire edition.

Plot Summary

Felton Reinstein tells his story looking back from a few months in the future. Felton was five when he found his father’s body hanging in the garage. The event deeply affected him. He experiences anxiety attacks and is a social outsider throughout his school career. Other kids call him “Squirrel Nuts.” Felton’s only friends are Gus and Peter. The three boys feel separate from the other kids, whom they derogatorily call “honkies,” in small Bluffton, Wisconsin. Felton lives with his single mom, Jerri, and 13-year-old brother Andrew, a skilled pianist. Jerri assures them their dad, Steven, was a kind, gentle person, but after his death, Jerri burned all the family mementos. Felton thinks that Jerri, with her peace-loving “hippy” lifestyle has always been odd, but she is growing stranger. Felton is casually insolent to her and Andrew.

Jerri worries that Felton, who spends his time in his basement bedroom, sleeping and watching TV, is isolated and possibly depressed. When Gus and his family leave for the summer, Jerri orders Felton to take over Gus’s paper route. Felton meets the summer renters in Gus’s house: Aleah Jennings, a beautiful Black teenage piano virtuoso, and her father, Ronald. Felton immediately falls for Aleah, and she for him. At the pool one day, Felton encounters Cody Frederick, who wants Felton to join the football team. Cody knows how fast Felton can run and thinks he would make the team unbeatable. Felton, feeling friendless, agrees. Felton begins weightlifting with Cody and the team and enjoys it; however, the coach’s son, high-school graduate Ken Johnson, ridicules him. Jerri grows pricklier, commenting on Felton’s resemblance to his dad and uncharacteristically cussing at him.

After Aleah and Ronald visit the Reinsteins, Felton excitedly feels that Aleah is his girlfriend, something he has never had before. He tries to email Gus, but Gus’s rude response makes Felton think their friendship is over. When Felton wakes up the next day, Jerri is gone. Felton and Andrew discover Jerri asleep in her car outside Aleah’s home, a bottle of wine beside her.

Jerri deteriorates. She drinks heavily and forbids Andrew from playing the piano. She stays in her room, crying and watching TV. Andrew burns all his possessions in a bonfire. He dresses in black and becomes, in Felton’s opinion, cutthroat like a pirate. He is determined to ask Jerri questions about Steven. Felton grows huge and strong, adopting a “barbarian” persona. He loses patience with Andrew and nearly hurts him. Felton avoids home as much as possible, weightlifting, riding his dad’s old bike, and running up a tall hill called the Mound. When Felton is moving and physically active, he feels peaceful. He does not share what is happening at home with Aleah or Cody.

Ken Johnson, jealous that Felton is a rising star, attempts to injure him in the weight room and hurts Felton’s back. After a fight with Andrew, Felton realizes that his anger and things at home are out of control, and they need help. He and Andrew run away to stay with Aleah and her father. Felton calls Grandma Berba, Jerri’s estranged mom, who immediately comes to help. Grandma explains that Steven got Jerri pregnant during her first year of college, and Jerri pressured him into marrying. Steven had affairs, lost his job, and died by suicide when Jerri filed for divorce. He was an athlete, and Felton looks exactly like him. Felton is furious at his late dad and furious at Jerri’s lies. He destroys his dad’s bike, and Jerri tearfully apologizes. Grandma moves in to care for them all.

Felton retreats from Aleah and his friends, turning off his phone and staying in the basement. Older kids think Felton faked his injury and leave trash and “faker” notes in his yard, but Felton believes it is his new friends who are harassing him. He ignores their messages. Jerri receives medication but will have to go to inpatient treatment. Andrew and Aleah play a special duet for Felton’s 16th birthday, and Felton and Aleah reconnect. Cody and friends bring Felton’s birthday party to him, and Felton realizes he has misjudged them. Felton reconciles with Gus. Jerri leaves for a mental health facility, leaving behind a single photograph of their smiling dad, saying he was not all bad. Felton improves at running football plays after watching videos of pro football player Walter Payton. Everyone (except Jerri, who calls and wishes him luck) comes to Felton’s first game. When Felton gets the ball, he runs “stupid fast,” and the stands erupt with cheers.

Stupid Fast is first in the Felton Reinstein trilogy, followed by Nothing Special (2012), which finds Felton and Gus searching for runaway Andrew, and I’m With Stupid (2013), in which Felton faces college recruitment and relationship issues.