Fifteen-year-old Garrett Durrell is sent by his rich parents to Lake Harmony, a boot camp in upstate New York, in order to break him down and build him up into a more obedient son. At the camp, Garrett is beaten, humiliated, and forced to spend weeks in solitary confinement for minor acts of disobedience. The only way out is to rise through the ranks from Level One to Level Six and eventually graduate, and the only way to do that is to show total obedience to the program and even participate in the abuse of lower-ranking kids. Garrett despairs of ever getting out, but he secretly befriends Sarah Sundwald and Pauly Vetare, two kids who have been imprisoned in the camp for over two years without getting past Level One.
Not to be confused with Boot Camp, a 2008 movie that's also about an abusive boot camp for troubled teens.
Boot Camp contains examples of:
- Bittersweet Ending: Sarah and Pauly both escape to Canada. Pauly is so sick that Sarah is forced to leave him at a hospital, but his father is so appalled by the condition he's in that he allows Pauly to return home to Florida instead of sending him back to Lake Harmony. Meanwhile, Rebecca starts speaking out about the abuse she suffered at camp, and as a result some of the inmates are pulled out by their parents, including Garrett. Unfortunately, by that point Garrett's mind has been broken, and he believes that he deserved the abuse.
- Bound and Gagged: When Garrett, Pauly, and Sarah make their escape, Joe chases after them in the woods outside the camp. The kids grab Joe, duct tape his mouth, wrists, and ankles, and hide him behind a tree trunk, where they hope he won't be found until morning.
- Cacophony Cover Up: In the cafeteria, loudspeakers play taped lectures at ear-aching volumes. The intention is to make it hard for residents to communicate, but it also means that if kids are careful, they can whisper to each other without being overheard.
- Child Prodigy: Garrett was reading at two and solving square roots at six. His parents and teachers lavished praise on him until he was eight, when he started using his intelligence in ways his parents disapproved of.
- Daddy Didn't Show: Garrett's parents are both lawyers, but his dad works for someone else while his mom owns her firm. When Garrett lived at home, his dad would show up for school plays and band performances and his mom hardly ever would. After six months at Lake Harmony, when his parents are finally given the opportunity to visit him for the first time, his dad shows up, but his mom is too busy with work.
- Great Escape: Pauly, Garrett, and Sarah hatch a plan for Garrett to create a distraction while Pauly opens the circuit-breaker box, shuts off power to the whole camp to disable the door locks and alarms, and locks the box with a padlock Sarah smuggled in with her. Then Garrett is supposed to steal as much food as he can carry from the kitchen while Sarah and Pauly set a fire with stolen matches and accelerants. When the gates open to let the fire trucks in, the three will make a break for it.
- I Never Got Any Letters: The kids are allowed to write letters to their parents, but the staff rip up any letter that criticizes Lake Harmony.
- Intelligence Equals Isolation: Garrett has always felt like an older person in a kid's body, and has never been able to connect with kids his own age.
- Make an Example of Them: Higher-ranking kids normally beat lower-ranking kids by slapping, twisting, and squeezing them, which doesn't leave marks. But after Garrett is brought back from his escape attempt, Joe temporarily suspends the rule against causing visible injuries, and Jon and Ron beat Garrett bloody so everyone else will see what happens to escapees.
- No Good Deed Goes Unpunished: Garrett, Sarah, and Pauly steal a boat to cross the Saint Lawrence River into Canada, first pulling out all the stoppers in the other boats at the dock. Harry and Rebecca stupidly chase after them in one of the boats, which almost immediately starts to sink. By the time the kids have reached the other side, Harry and Rebecca's boat is foundering in the middle of the river. Rather than leave them to drown, Garrett drops Sarah and Pauly off, then takes his boat back into the river to pull Harry and Rebecca aboard. They reward him for saving them by taking him right back to Lake Harmony. Mr. Z even references this trope by name while punishing Garrett.
- Passing Notes in Class: Garrett finds a pencil nub in the parking lot. He uses it to write notes on torn notebook paper and hide them under the desk for Sarah and Pauly to find. He disguises his handwriting by writing with his left hand and uses code like referring to their escape plan as "Pauly's joke." His precautions work so well that even when Adam finds one of his notes and tattles on him, he escapes punishment because Joe can't match the handwriting in the note with the handwriting in his notebook.
- Physical Fitness Punishment: Exercise is commonly used as a punishment. After Garrett is brought back from his escape attempt, he's forced to run barefoot, carrying a tire in each arm. If he drops a tire or falls, the staff hit him. When he's finally too exhausted to stand, they make him crawl to the isolation room.
- Playing Sick: When Garrett was eight, he forged a letter from his mother saying he had asthma so he could get out of gym class. He lasted almost six months before getting caught.
- Potty Emergency: While Garrett's "transporters" are driving him to Lake Harmony, he complains of having to go to the bathroom, but they accuse him of manipulating them and plotting an escape attempt.
- Self-Harm: Sarah slashes up her arms with scissors.
- Shameful Strip: The first thing Garrett has to do at Lake Harmony is submit to a cavity search before putting on the camp's uniform. A staff member tells him that if he doesn't take his clothes off in twenty seconds, he'll be forced to stand in the same spot for the next twenty-four hours.
- Sinister Shiv: Adam has sharpened a toothbrush into a shiv that he uses to threaten the other boys.
- Skipping School: Garrett has been regularly cutting school since he was twelve. He's smart enough to get good grades with minimal effort, so he doesn't see why he has to spend time being bored in class. His parents felt otherwise and told him he had to go to school every day, but he didn't listen.
- Teacher/Student Romance: Garrett was in a relationship with his math teacher Sabrina, who is eight years older than he is. His parents got her fired, but they didn't press statutory rape charges because they were embarrassed that their son was dating his teacher and didn't want anyone to find out. Garrett kept seeing her, even sneaking out to spend the night at her apartment. That was the main reason his parents decided to send him to Lake Harmony.
- Why Couldn't You Be Different?: Everyone at Lake Harmony is there because their parents were dissatisfied with them for one reason or another. Jon was a delinquent who stole bikes and sold drugs, Sarah disagreed with her parents' Mormon faith, and Pauly was Mistaken for Gay by his dad for being small and unathletic.Pauly: Your parents sent you here because they want you to be a different person. Mr. Z and company are happy to oblige.
