- Voice: Sarah Beth Goer covers all of room 117 alone, four difficult students plus one burned-out teacher, inside a six-hour recording.
- Big ideas: a class written off by its school, second chances for a teacher, reading difficulty, unlikely solidarity
- Atmosphere: Warm and wisecracking, with something sourer running underneath
- Worth it?: A sharp middle-grade comedy whose reviewers never once name a character in it.
Granddaughter loves this author. That is the whole text of a five-star review attached to this audiobook: four words, and no mention of The Unteachables anywhere in it. Nor is it an outlier. Across the whole column, not one person names Mr. Kermit, room 117, Aldo, Parker, Kiana or Elaine. Six hours of a very particular classroom, and the people who liked it most are describing a reading habit.
The Review
Room 117 is where the school puts the students it has given up on: Aldo, who has anger management issues, Parker, who cannot read, Kiana, who does not belong in the class or arguably in any class, and Elaine, whose name the copy notes rhymes with pain. Their teacher is Mr. Zachary Kermit, once a rising star, now the most burned-out teacher in all of Greenwich and a single year from early retirement after a cheating scandal wrecked him. A superintendent who wants that retirement derailed puts the two halves together deliberately.
Sarah Beth Goer reads the whole room. That is six hours of work with a cast built entirely on difference: a kid who rages, a kid who cannot decode a sentence, a kid who fits nowhere, and an adult who stopped caring on purpose. Middle-grade comedy depends on those distinctions being audible in the first line each character speaks. One reader handling all of them is ordinary practice at this age and this length, and it is equally the point where the book either comes alive or blurs together.
Five of the six votes behind the 4.8 badge came with writing attached. Four gave five stars, one gave four, so the visible column is worth twenty-four points. A 4.8 across six votes only lands if those six total twenty-nine, which leaves five points for the single person who graded in silence. That vote was a five. The listing sits one point short of a clean sweep, and the point that went missing belongs to Sleepy, the only reviewer who describes the plot at all.
Why Listen to The Unteachables
Gordon Korman has been making this kind of book for a long time, and Sleepy states the appeal exactly: "Like most of Korman's books, this has a good mix of humor and educational perseverance." That is the deal on offer, plainly labeled. The jokes are real jokes, the redemption is signposted from the opening chapter, and nobody pretends otherwise. Nic V. Farley calls the characters "quirky, lovable, and full of surprises" and praises the way the book handles redemption and teamwork "without feeling heavy-handed," which is the exact failure mode this genre falls into.
Six hours suits the age group and the story alike. It does not ask a nine-year-old to hold a plot across two weeks of bedtimes, and it matches the book's own shape, which runs the course of a single school year from first day to last. Suzan Beeson, who bought it for middle schoolers and enjoyed it anyway, files it as "Captivating book that is also funny in places" and "Realistic fiction at its best." Two audiences, one runtime, no adjustment required.
Mr. Kermit is why this holds for adults. A teacher counting down to early retirement after a professional disgrace is a bleak premise for a children's comedy, and Sleepy's summary is blunter than the publisher's: a man "counting down the days to his early retirement after a cheating fiasco killed hos career and dreams over a decade ago." The typo belongs to the original. The sentence is still the most accurate description of this book on the entire page.
The Caveats
Aldo, Parker, Kiana and Elaine are named in the description and nowhere else. That is worth registering before buying for a particular child, because the reviews cannot tell you how the book treats them. Parker's whole storyline is about being unable to read. Kiana's is about belonging nowhere. Whether those threads land as respect or as punchline is the one question a parent would want answered, and five reviewers, every one of them positive, leave it hanging.
Sleepy's four-star entry, filed in July 2021 and the oldest here by four years, is also the only one that adds anything the description omits: an old enemy and an overly enthusiastic fellow teacher who help turn the class around. Neither figure appears in the publisher copy at all. If you are trying to work out whether this is a classroom ensemble piece or a two-hander between a teacher and his worst student, that stray clause is the only evidence on offer.
Adults get addressed directly by the copy, which signs off on a note no child would recognize: an excellent choice for tween readers in grades 4 to 6, in the classroom or for homeschooling. That is a purchase-order sentence attached to a recording, and it explains the shape of the column beneath it. Two entries here were written by an adult reporting a child's reaction, and a third by an adult who bought it for middle schoolers and read it anyway. That same copy still opens by calling this "A hilarious new middle grade novel." The adjective has been sitting there unedited since January 2019, and nothing else on the listing looks any fresher.
Should You Listen to The Unteachables?
Kids in grades four through six are the stated target and the natural fit, reluctant readers most of all, since six hours of audio removes the exact barrier Parker spends the book fighting. The humor is broad enough to work out loud and the redemption arc is clean without being sugary. Adults raised on school comedies will find Mr. Kermit sourer and funnier than the cover implies, which is why more than one person in this column read it with no child in the room. Teachers have the clearest use of all, and the copy says so outright. A recording also sidesteps the awkwardness of assigning a novel about a boy who cannot read to a class that contains one.
Anyone shopping for a child who has been written off by a school will find that this book takes the premise seriously before it takes it comically, and the difference matters. Listeners who want to know how Sarah Beth Goer separates four difficult kids from one exhausted teacher will have to find out firsthand, because nobody here says a word about it. Give it to a nine-year-old and stay in the room for it.
A Few Questions About The Unteachables
Would this audiobook suit a reluctant reader?
That may be its best use. Six hours of listening removes the decoding barrier entirely, and one of the four students in room 117 cannot read, so the difficulty is taken seriously instead of played for laughs. HarperCollins aims the book at grades four to six, in a classroom or at home.
What age is this audiobook aimed at?
The copy states grades four to six, in the classroom or for homeschooling. Nic V. Farley calls it perfect for middle-grade readers and adds that adults will enjoy it too. Suzan Beeson bought it for middle schoolers and liked it independently. The humor is broad and nothing in the subject matter is graphic.
Is The Unteachables part of a series?
No series name or number appears on the listing, and not one reviewer here mentions a sequel. The copy points fans of Ms. Bixby's Last Day toward it, but that is a recommendation rather than a sequence. Nothing here suggests a follow-up, so plan on one self-contained story.
