Don't Call Me Ishmael

Blurb

Don't Call Me Ishmael is a young adult novel by Australian author Michael Gerard Bauer. It is about Ishmael Leseur, a 14-year-old boy, and his experiences in Year Nine of school. It won the 2008 award for children's literature at Writers' Week, Australia's oldest writers' festival. It was short-listed for the Children's Book Council of Australia's Book of the Year award in the older reader category in 2007.
His Year Nine teacher, Miss Tarango, tells the whole class about the name Ishmael coming from Moby-Dick, which gives Barry and his friends more names to tease Ishmael with. Ishmael later intervenes when he sees Barry and his friends tease a boy who joins Ishmael's year level. A new boy called James Scobie becomes a target for bullying because of his appearance. However, James responds to the bully's taunts with humour. He tells the class that he is fearless because he had a brain tumour that damaged the part of his brain that feels fear. Barry is the only person that does not believe James. About a week later Barry puts a lot of insects and spiders in James's desk, but James is not frightened.