
Guys Read: "What? You Think You Got It Rough?"
A Story from Guys Read: Funny Business
Failed to add items
Add to Cart failed.
Add to Wish List failed.
Remove from wishlist failed.
Adding to library failed
Follow podcast failed
Unfollow podcast failed
$0.99/mo for the first 3 months

Buy for $1.79
No default payment method selected.
We are sorry. We are not allowed to sell this product with the selected payment method
-
Narrated by:
-
Michael Boatman
About this listen
It’s here: Volume One of the official Guys Read Library. Jon Scieszka’s Guys Read initiative was founded on a simple premise: that young guys enjoy reading most when they have reading they can enjoy. And out of this comes a series that aims to give them just that. Ten books, arranged by theme, featuring the best of the best where writing for kids is concerned. Each book is a collection of original short stories, but these aren’t your typical anthologies - each book is edgy, inventive, visual, and one-of-a-kind, featuring a different theme for guys to get excited about.
Funny Business is based around the theme of - what else - humor, and if you’re familiar with Jon and Guys Read, you already know what you’re in store for: 10 hilarious stories from some of the funniest writers around. Before you’re through, you’ll meet a teenage mummy; a kid desperate to take a dip in the world’s largest pool of chocolate milk; a homicidal turkey; parents who hand over their son’s room to a biker; the only kid in his middle school who hasn’t turned into a vampire, wizard, or superhero; and more. And the contributor list includes best-selling authors, award winners, and fresh new talent alike: Mac Barnett, Eoin Colfer, Christopher Paul Curtis, Kate DiCamillo (writing with Jon Scieszka), Paul Feig, Jack Gantos, Jeff Kinney, David Lubar, Adam Rex, and David Yoo.
Guys Read is all about turning young readers and listeners into life-long ones - and with this book, and each subsequent installment in the series, we aim to leave no guy unturned.
©2010 Christopher Paul Curtis (P)2010 HarperCollins PublishersListeners also enjoyed...
-
Bucking the Sarge
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: Michael Boatman
- Length: 6 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Luther T. Farrell has got to get out of Flint, Michigan. As his best friend Sparky says, "Flint's nothing but the Titanic."
-
-
Great Book - even for me!
- By Leslie on 10-24-04
-
The Madman of Piney Woods
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne, JD Jackson
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Benji and Red couldn't be more different. They aren't friends. They don't even live in the same town. But their fates are entwined. A chance meeting leads the boys to discover that they have more in common than meets the eye. Both of them have encountered a strange presence in the forest, watching them, tracking them. Could the Madman of Piney Woods be real?
-
-
Realistic fiction
- By Felise Williams on 04-22-25
-
The Mighty Miss Malone
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
- Length: 7 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the Newbery Medal and Coretta Scott King Award - winning Bud, not Buddy, Bud met a girl named Deza Malone in a Hooverville. This is her story. “We are a family on a journey to a place called wonderful" is the motto of Deza Malone's family. Deza is the smartest girl in her class in Gary, Indiana, singled out by teachers for a special path in life. But the Great Depression has hit Gary hard, and there are no jobs for black men. When her beloved father leaves to find work, Deza, Mother, and her older brother Jimmie go in search of him.
-
-
Loved the reader and the story
- By Erika Shaffer on 09-18-13
-
Bud, Not Buddy
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: James Avery
- Length: 5 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It’s 1936, in Flint Michigan. Times may be hard, and ten-year-old Bud may be a motherless boy on the run, but Bud’s got a few things going for him. 1. He has his own suitcase full of special things. 2. He’s the author of Bud Caldwell’s Rules and Things for Having a Funner Life and Making a Better Liar Out of Yourself. 3. His momma never told him who his father was, but she left a clue: flyers advertising Herman E. Calloway and his famous band, the Dusky Devastators of the Depression!!!!!! Bud’s got an idea that those flyers will lead him to his father.
-
-
Great Family Audio
- By Dionne on 02-21-09
-
The Watsons Go to Birmingham: 1963
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: LeVar Burton
- Length: 4 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When the Watson family—ten-year-old Kenny, Momma, Dad, little sister Joetta, and brother Byron—sets out on a trip south to visit Grandma in Birmingham, Alabama, they don’t realize that they’re heading toward one of the darkest moments in America’s history. The Watsons’ journey reminds us that even in the hardest times, laughter and family can help us get through anything.
-
-
Funny and Poignant Look at Civil Rights Era
- By EmilyK on 08-26-14
-
Elijah of Buxton
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: Mirron Willis
- Length: 8 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When you first walk into a room in a house, or into a stable, they have a way of telling you they know you're there. It ain't nothing particular noticeable, but the air inside of �em changes like it's saying, "I'm watching you". But I'd got into this stable so quiet and sneakish that nothing knowed I'd cracked open the door, held my breath, and took a step inside.
-
-
Great Book, but not for young children
- By Michael Yardley on 12-09-08
-
Bucking the Sarge
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: Michael Boatman
- Length: 6 hrs and 9 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Luther T. Farrell has got to get out of Flint, Michigan. As his best friend Sparky says, "Flint's nothing but the Titanic."
-
-
Great Book - even for me!
- By Leslie on 10-24-04
-
The Madman of Piney Woods
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: Kirby Heyborne, JD Jackson
- Length: 8 hrs and 59 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Benji and Red couldn't be more different. They aren't friends. They don't even live in the same town. But their fates are entwined. A chance meeting leads the boys to discover that they have more in common than meets the eye. Both of them have encountered a strange presence in the forest, watching them, tracking them. Could the Madman of Piney Woods be real?
-
-
Realistic fiction
- By Felise Williams on 04-22-25
-
The Mighty Miss Malone
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: Bahni Turpin
- Length: 7 hrs and 54 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the Newbery Medal and Coretta Scott King Award - winning Bud, not Buddy, Bud met a girl named Deza Malone in a Hooverville. This is her story. “We are a family on a journey to a place called wonderful" is the motto of Deza Malone's family. Deza is the smartest girl in her class in Gary, Indiana, singled out by teachers for a special path in life. But the Great Depression has hit Gary hard, and there are no jobs for black men. When her beloved father leaves to find work, Deza, Mother, and her older brother Jimmie go in search of him.
-
-
Loved the reader and the story
- By Erika Shaffer on 09-18-13
-
Bud, Not Buddy
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: James Avery
- Length: 5 hrs and 14 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
It’s 1936, in Flint Michigan. Times may be hard, and ten-year-old Bud may be a motherless boy on the run, but Bud’s got a few things going for him. 1. He has his own suitcase full of special things. 2. He’s the author of Bud Caldwell’s Rules and Things for Having a Funner Life and Making a Better Liar Out of Yourself. 3. His momma never told him who his father was, but she left a clue: flyers advertising Herman E. Calloway and his famous band, the Dusky Devastators of the Depression!!!!!! Bud’s got an idea that those flyers will lead him to his father.
-
-
Great Family Audio
- By Dionne on 02-21-09
-
The Watsons Go to Birmingham: 1963
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: LeVar Burton
- Length: 4 hrs and 55 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When the Watson family—ten-year-old Kenny, Momma, Dad, little sister Joetta, and brother Byron—sets out on a trip south to visit Grandma in Birmingham, Alabama, they don’t realize that they’re heading toward one of the darkest moments in America’s history. The Watsons’ journey reminds us that even in the hardest times, laughter and family can help us get through anything.
-
-
Funny and Poignant Look at Civil Rights Era
- By EmilyK on 08-26-14
-
Elijah of Buxton
- By: Christopher Paul Curtis
- Narrated by: Mirron Willis
- Length: 8 hrs and 58 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
When you first walk into a room in a house, or into a stable, they have a way of telling you they know you're there. It ain't nothing particular noticeable, but the air inside of �em changes like it's saying, "I'm watching you". But I'd got into this stable so quiet and sneakish that nothing knowed I'd cracked open the door, held my breath, and took a step inside.
-
-
Great Book, but not for young children
- By Michael Yardley on 12-09-08
-
Maybe You Never Cry Again
- By: Bernie Mac
- Narrated by: Bernie Mac
- Length: 4 hrs and 25 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
By the tender age of five, Bernie Mac had found his calling: making others laugh. He has since become the star and cocreator of Fox’s hit sitcom The Bernie Mac Show; a stand-up legend; and a hit movie star in Head of State and Charlie’s Angels: Full Throttle. Now, this amazing comedian delves deep down inside to retell the poignant and hilarious story of his childhood and the people who helped shape him into the comedian - and the strong and self-reliant man - he is today.
-
-
Sad & Happy Story, But Very Well Missed Bernie,RIP
- By Eddie G on 03-20-13
By: Bernie Mac
-
Different Seasons
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Frank Muller
- Length: 20 hrs and 15 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Four gripping novellas tied together by the changing of seasons. Hope Springs Eternal - "Rita Hayworth and the Shawshank Redemption": An unjustly imprisoned convict seeks a strange and startling revenge...the basis for the Best Picture Academy Award nominee The Shawshank Redemption.
-
-
Fantastic!
- By Robert A. Raymond on 02-14-16
By: Stephen King
-
Rabbit
- The Autobiography of Ms. Pat
- By: Patricia Williams, Jeannine Amber
- Narrated by: Patricia Williams
- Length: 7 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
One of five children, Pat watched as her alcoholic mother struggled to get by on charity, cons, and petty crimes. At age seven, Pat was taught to roll drunks for money. At 12, she was targeted for sex by a man eight years her senior; by 13, she was pregnant. By 15, Pat was a mother of two. Alone at 16, Pat was determined to make a better life for her children. But with no job skills and an eighth-grade education, her options were limited. She learned quickly that hustling and humor were the only tools she had to survive.
-
-
Amazing story but dry reading
- By SpazzyMaggee on 11-03-17
By: Patricia Williams, and others
-
The Bazaar of Bad Dreams
- Stories
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: Stephen King, Dylan Baker, Brooke Bloom, and others
- Length: 20 hrs and 11 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
A master storyteller at his best - the O. Henry Prize winner Stephen King delivers a generous collection of stories, several of them brand-new, featuring revelatory autobiographical comments on when, why, and how he came to write (or rewrite) each story. Magnificent, eerie, utterly compelling, these stories comprise one of King's finest gifts to his constant fan. "I made them especially for you," says King. "Feel free to examine them, but please be careful. The best of them have teeth."
-
-
HE'S A CUP OF COFFEE
- By Jim "The Impatient" on 12-10-15
By: Stephen King
-
Room
- A Novel
- By: Emma Donoghue
- Narrated by: Michal Friedman, Ellen Archer, Robert Petkoff, and others
- Length: 10 hrs and 45 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
To five-year-old Jack, Room is the entire world. It is where he was born and grew up; it's where he lives with his Ma as they learn and read and eat and sleep and play. At night, his Ma shuts him safely in the wardrobe, where he is meant to be asleep when Old Nick visits. Room is home to Jack, but to Ma, it is the prison where Old Nick has held her captive for seven years. Through determination, ingenuity, and fierce motherly love, Ma has created a life for Jack. But she knows it's not enough...not for her or for him.
-
-
Good book... Buy it in print
- By Caitland on 12-18-10
By: Emma Donoghue
-
Necessary Lies
- By: Diane Chamberlain
- Narrated by: Alison Elliott
- Length: 10 hrs and 51 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Best-selling author Diane Chamberlain delivers a breakout book about a small southern town 50 years ago, and the darkest - and most hopeful - places in the human heart. After losing her parents, 15-year-old Ivy Hart is left to care for her grandmother, older sister, and nephew as tenants on a small tobacco farm. As she struggles with her grandmother’s aging, her sister’s mental illness, and her own epilepsy, she realizes they might need more than she can give. When Jane Forrester takes a position as Grace County’s newest social worker, she doesn’t realize just how much her help is needed.
-
-
Sometimes the truth is hard to hear. Listen anyway
- By Nana on 01-26-15
-
Freak the Mighty
- By: Rodman Philbrick
- Narrated by: Elden Henson
- Length: 3 hrs and 16 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Meet Maxwell Kane, narrator of Freak the Mighty. He's a timid soul stuck in the body of a teenage giant with size 14 shoes. Haunted by a dark secret in his past, he hides out in his basement room, avoiding the world. But when a new kid moves in next door, Max's life changes forever. The two outcasts form the "normal" world team up to become "Freak the Mighty".
-
-
A Mighty book for fifth graders
- By the teach on 01-16-13
By: Rodman Philbrick
-
From a Buick 8
- By: Stephen King
- Narrated by: James Rebhorn, Bruce Davison, Becky Ann Baker
- Length: 13 hrs and 23 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Stephen King's first full-length solo novel since Dreamcatcher, the long-awaited From a Buick 8 is "nearly flawless and one terrific entertainment," says Publishers Weekly. A strange car acts as a conduit between our world and some other...and the boogeyman of this creepy story is our collective fascination with deadly things.
-
-
Narration nightmare
- By Randall on 03-24-18
By: Stephen King
-
I Know This Much Is True
- By: Wally Lamb
- Narrated by: Ken Howard
- Length: 5 hrs and 42 mins
- Abridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
In the long awaited follow-up to the highly praised novel She's Come Undone, Dominick Birdsey must come to terms with himself, as well as with the schizophrenic twin brother he has spent his life both protecting and resenting.
-
-
Disappointing
- By Douglas on 03-20-08
By: Wally Lamb
-
Kizzy Ann Stamps
- By: Jeri Watts
- Narrated by: Quincy Tyler Bernstine
- Length: 3 hrs and 47 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Kizzy Ann Stamps is starting at a new school, the just-integrated public school, and she’s worried. She’s worried that the white students won’t like her, and she’s worried they’ll stare at the scar that runs from the tip of her right eye to the corner of her smile - the scar a neighbor boy gave her, in a farming accident. But now this same boy won’t stop following Kizzy and Shag, her beloved border collie, everywhere they go - even when they’re practicing for an upcoming herding competition. And though Kizzy and Shag have been training hard, Kizzy and her coach aren’t sure they’ll even let her, a black girl, enter the competition.
-
-
Amazing Figurative Language
- By Anonymous User on 03-02-25
By: Jeri Watts
-
Who Am I Without Him?
- Short Stories about Girls and the Boys in their Lives
- By: Sharon Flake
- Narrated by: Myra Lucretia Taylor, Cherise Boothe, Corey Allen, and others
- Length: 4 hrs and 53 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Guys and girls get together, get played, and get real. Who Am I Without Him? is a Booklist Top 10 Romance Novel for Teens and is "breaking new and necessary ground" in 12 short stories about guys and girls falling in and out of love and relationships, testing out ways to communicate with one another, respect each other - and respect themselves. This is a complex, often humorous, and always on-point exploration of today's teens determined to find love and self-worth...any way they know how.
-
-
Great!
- By raushannah on 09-17-23
By: Sharon Flake
-
Finding Me
- A Decade of Darkness, a Life Reclaimed
- By: Michelle Knight, Michelle Burford
- Narrated by: Maria Cabezas
- Length: 7 hrs and 13 mins
- Unabridged
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
Michelle was a young single mother when she was kidnapped by a local school bus driver named Ariel Castro. For more than a decade afterward, she endured unimaginable torture at the hand of her abductor. In 2003 Amanda Berry joined her in captivity, followed by Gina DeJesus in 2004. Their escape on May 6, 2013, made headlines around the world.
-
-
A True House of Horrors!
- By Courtney on 05-12-14
By: Michelle Knight, and others
What listeners say about Guys Read: "What? You Think You Got It Rough?"
Average customer ratingsReviews - Please select the tabs below to change the source of reviews.
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Steven Ray Hill
- 03-04-20
Sounds like my family reunion.
Iron John was one bad dude stay out of range of his board of education.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!
-
Overall
-
Performance
-
Story
- Terry J Goss
- 10-01-15
So Funny !
My whole 7th grade class loved listening to this. The looks on there faces when they realized what the little kids thought was happening were priceless. I had to stop it because of the ewe noises.
Something went wrong. Please try again in a few minutes.
You voted on this review!
You reported this review!