I had to read this book for school, but unlike many mandatory English books, I thoroughly enjoyed it. It's about a girl called Calma, her friend Kiffo and the nasty new teacher Miss Payne (or as they refer to her as, the Pitbull).
I really liked the first person, informal kind of conversational writing style. It helped me understand Calma better and feel more emotion.
As for the back stories of these characters, Calma lives alone with her mum, she calls, 'the Fridge'. It's lonely and they don't have many luxuries. Kiffo, lives in a run down house with his dad.
The Pitbull, well... Calma and Kiffo try and work out if she's an evil mastermind drug dealer motorbike racer or an intelligent kind lady who's real personality is sometimes hidden beneath a snarl.
Our protagonist - Calma. She doesn't always get everything write, and it doesn't make it annoyingly easy for the reader to guess what's going to happen. Calma thinks one thing, and a couple chapters later you're second guessing her.
Overall, I would recommend this book to a friend. It's an enjoyable read and an interesting storyline.
Thanks :)

This book was a roller coaster of a ride. I absolutely enjoyed it, I fell in love with the characters and I really felt an emotional pull from the events in the story. There is some great intrigue and emotional drama, you get drawn into the story and it reflects the reality of life that is: you don't always understand the things that are happening and the people who are in your life. It's a really great story which is funny, exciting, dramatic and heart-wrenching at times.

I would recommend this book to anyone thirteen years old or over. I really enjoyed it. (The Pitbull is a teacher who is really mean, and Kiffo is a student who is not easily pushed around. The other main character is called Carma, who is a friend of Kiffo, one of his only friends, and she gets swept into his problems, his drama and all of his issues.

As troubled as this story sounds from this description, it is a really great story which I thoroughly enjoyed and found really moving.

This is absolutely hilarious for most of the text. The narrator is very well written and funny. And then the end comes along and hits you like a freight train. Needs to be wrapped up a little more solidly.

This book has a good collection of witty teenage humor, but not much of a story behind it. More a book about its characters than the story, but even then the characters feel a bit shallow somehow.

May have alot of cussing, but still a good read. It gets really sad at the end. It made me cry.

One of my past favourites. Can't quite remember what it was exactly like but I still love it.

Of course in the end my favorite character dies. I didn't understand the purpose of the Grade 6 flashbacks, but what do I know. Overall decent waste of time.

Made me laugh out loud. I liked the wit, humour and honesty of this book. I bought it ages ago and kept saving it when for when I'd need cheering up as it seemed funny. So to start 2016 with a funny book was great BUT it's also sad in bits. A bit like life eh? Thanks Mr Jonsberg for this book. It's clever and sweet, sad and happy, sarcastic and serious.

The whole business with Kiffo and the Pitbull is a funny and intriguing novel about a Girl called Calma, and Kiffo. These two become unlikely partners and as a series of events about the mysterious and possibly illegal actions of The PITBULL AKA Mrs Payne (a rather accurate name is you ask Calma), an unlikely friendship is rekindled into a strong bond. I would highly recommend this book to anyone looking for an easy, yet enjoyable read.

Jonsberg’s The Whole Buisness with Kiffo and the Pitbull is a novel about a teenage girl Calma Harrison and her friend Jaryd ‘Kiffo’ Kiffing and a new teacher to the school Miss Payne or The Pitbull as she is called by the two. The story is about Calma and Kiffo snooping around to try and find out the dirt on this woman, as well as the strength of their friendships and normal teenage life. Jonsberg’s novel is a good read with the wittiness of his characters but the seriousness of real life situations. A great ending to another fantastic read.

n  Trigger & Content Warningsn

Alcohol consumption & smoking
Car & motorcycle accident
Animal abuse (dog)

The new teacher was young, inexperienced. She thought she could get through to the kids - bless her - and make a difference to the dumbells in my Year 10 class. She is frighteningly cheerful, smiling at everyone all of the time and generally spooking us out. She over-prepares her lessons. You can tell she spends hours putting them together and finding materials she thinks are interesting. In short? She's a disaster waiting to happen.
She asks Jaryd to put the ball down. She asks Jaryd to get his feet off the desk. The infinite patience in her voice makes you want to poke her eye out with a stick.
Amazingly, Jaryd does what she asks, but she pushes it, just a little further.
"Now get your books out and put that football away, Jaryd Kiffing."
We watched the ball arc slowly over the desks. I knew, I swear to God, that his aim was perfect. It might not have been so bad, just being smacked on the back of the head, but she was writing on the blackboard and the force shoved her head forward so that she head-butted the board.
One minute Miss Leanyer was the small, quiet, timid teacher, the next, she was a raving lunatic. She leaped over desks to get to the back of the room and fell on Kiffo like an avenging harpy. Face twisted into a mad grimace, she was banging his head on the wall when Mr. Brewer came in and dragged her away. The last we ever saw of Miss Leanyer were her wild, raging eyes and fingers still clawing the air for Kiffo's throat.
Kiffo had a few weeks of fame, but then Miss Payne appeared...and Jaryd Kiffing was a marked man.
If Miss Leanyer was the Snow White of the educational world, Miss Payne was the slash-em up homicidal maniac. And Kiffo was home alone, and the phone lines had been cut.
Find out what happens in Calma’s 10th grade English class when they have to break in a new teacher…who might just break them.