The Boy Who Owned The School By Gary Paulsen

I have mixed feelings about the book, The Boy Who Owned the School by Gary Paulsen. Even though the book has a happy ending, the story is very dark. Jacob the protagonist thinks he is ugly, he is bullied at school, he tries to becomes the phantom student that roams from class to class, he has no friends, his parents are alcoholics and they pay no attention to him, and his sister hates him. If that were not enough, Jacob sleeps in a dark, dingy basement on a cot, while the rest of his family sleeps upstairs. His room is more like a dungeon than a bedroom. Although the book ends with Jacob and Maria going out and with his mother paying more attention to him, I expected Jacob to change and stop hiding from everyone, but the book does not give