Holling Hoodhook has uncovered the plans of Mrs.Baker, his 7th grade language arts teacher, to assassinate him. He is the only student coming between her and student-free Wednesday afternoons. All the other students are either at Catholic catechism classes or Hebrew school. As the sole Presbyterian in the class, Holling has no religious classes to attend, and thus must stay alone with Mrs. Baker each Wednesday afternoon. Unable to dump Holling in remedial math, Mrs. Baker escalates her nefarious plot to do Holling in by involving Doug Sweiteck's crazy older brother. However, after a few weeks of blundered assassination attempts, Mrs. Baker instead tries to torture Holling to death by teaching him Shakespeare every afternoon. Little does she know, Holling really digs The Bard, and her plot is again foiled. Week by week, as Holling learns more and more about human nature through the plays of Shakespeare, especially as applied to his 7th grade classmates and his extraordinarily inattentive parents, he and Mrs. Baker forge a bond that transcends literature and delves into the realm of Yankee baseball, the Vietnam War, two classroom pet rats, cream puffs, and a camping trip. In the process, Mrs. Baker and the Bard team up to teach Holling what it takes to grow up to be a wise and good man, a lesson Holling learns well.
