Howie Kemp

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Howie Kemp is a fictional character in the Ramona series of novels by Beverly Cleary.

Fictional character personality

Howard "Howie" Kemp is the curly-haired boy who lives next door to Ramona. They are friends (mainly because their parents are friends) but sometimes they don't like each other. Howie is the polar opposite of Ramona. Ramona is imaginative and easily excited. Howie is analytical, literal, and never gets excited, which frustrates Ramona. When Ramona tells her class that workmen chopped a hole in their house in Ramona the Brave to make a new addition, Howie tells the class she is lying. His point is that the workmen pried off some siding and technically did not "chop a hole" in the house. Howie's parents think that he needs to be more creative. As Ramona becomes older, she feels that she has outgrown Howie and that she is tired of being babysat by his grandmother after school every day and bored of pounding nails with him, and wants to find a more intimate friend.

Howie's Grandmother lives with Howie's family and babysits Ramona after school. Howie's toddler sister, Willa Jean Kemp, is a spoiled brat pampered by her family. She is described as being sticky, crumby, into everything and always has to have her own way. Willa Jean is a source of great annoyance to Ramona, as Ramona is usually expected to entertain her whenever she is with the Kemps. In Ramona Forever, Howie's rich Uncle Hobart brings her an expensive accordion from Saudi Arabia. Howie's grandmother puts the accordion away for Willa Jean to learn when she gets older, but Willa Jean wants to play with it right now. She can't bring herself to lift the heavy instrument so she sticks one foot under the hand strap, pulls the accordion out completely, and then sits on it, omitting a huge sound, destroying the accordion and silencing it forever.

Fictional biography

Howie has a fascination with tools and building things. Mr. Kemp regularly brings scrap wood home for Howie to build projects with. One time, Howie took a wheel off Ramona's tricycle to turn it into a bicycle, which pleased Ramona. In Ramona and Her Mother, Howie and Ramona made a boat out of scrap wood and tried to make it float in a tub of water. Ramona tried to make it blue by using some bluing liquid. While reaching for it, she spilled it all over both of them, much to Howie and his grandmother's dismay. He also made tin can stilts for both of them when Ramona told him that Mrs. Swink did that as a child.

Howie and Ramona like to play a game called Brick Factory, where they collect bricks from around the neighborhood and pound them to dust.

In third grade, Howie becomes Ramona's cousin because his Uncle Hobart gets married to Ramona's Aunt Beatrice.