Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy and Goth Girlby Barry Lyga
Publishers Weekly
:
Life is pretty dismal for the geeky 15-year-old narrator of Lyga's debut novel, who will quickly win over readers. He is mostly ignored by his beer-guzzling, gun-toting stepfather (aka "step-fascist") and pregnant mother (who still calls him Donnie), and harassed at school. His only friend, Cal, ignores him whenever the popular guys come around. Then a goth girl named Kyra sends him a surprise email, and he finds someone to talk to about everything from comics to their disdain for their classmates ("Someone could walk through the halls with a machine gun and kill ninety-nine percent of the people in that place and I wouldn't care," Kyra says). He even shows her the graphic novel he is hoping to publish so he can "get away from here. Start new somewhere else." But while Kyra is always blunt and angry, "fanboy" (as she calls him) begins slowly to piece together just how troubled she is. The story unfolds slowly, and a few resolutions seem scripted, such as the narrator making sudden peace with the step-fascist. But fanboy's comic book obsession feels authentic, in the way he describes famous authors, the difficulty of creating a comic ("You have to decide if the words are important enough to cover up the artwork that's telling half the story"), and even life inside a comic-book convention. His relationship with Kyra seems real, too; they are both truly outsiders, full of confusion and pain ("I don't know how I got here," he says during their big fight. "I don't think she knows, either"). In the end, there is plenty here to keep readers engaged. Ages 14-up. (Oct.) Agent: Kathleen Anderson, Anderson Literary Management. Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
| distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.: |
School Library Journal
:
Starred Review. Gr 9 Up–On good days, Fanboy is invisible to the students at his high school. On bad ones, he's a target for bullying and violence. When a classmate is cruel to him, Fanboy adds him to The List and moves on. His only real friend, Cal, is a jock who can't be seen with him in public. Their love of comics, though, keeps them close friends outside of school. Reading comics and writing his own graphic novel, Schemata, are the only things that keep him sane. He dreams of showing his work to a famous author at a comic-book convention and being discovered as the next great graphic novelist. When Goth Girl Kyra IMs him with photos of him being beaten up, he's skeptical. Why does she care what happens to him? He learns, though, that she's as much an outsider as he is. The two form a tentative friendship based on hatred of their classmates, particularly jocks, and her interest in Schemata. Fanboy is a rule follower, but Kyra is a rebel with a foul mouth. She teaches him to stand up for himself, and gives him the confidence to do it. Lyga looks at how teens are pushed to their limits by society. Though he toys with such concepts as teen suicide and Columbine-like violence, the novel never turns tragic. His love of comics carries over into all three teen characters, breathing animation into a potentially sad but often funny story. This is a great bridge book for teens who already like graphic novels.–Stephanie L. Petruso, Anne Arundel County Public Library, Odenton, MD Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
| distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.: |
BookList
: From BookList, September 1, 2006, Copyright © American Library Association. Used with permission. : "I'm a computer geek, a comic book geek, a study geek. Even in the Fast-Track classes, I'm apart." Fifteen-year-old Fanboy is miserable at school, where he is bullied, and at home, with his pregnant mother and her husband, the "step-fascist." His only relief is the late hours spent creating his own comic book. Then he receives an instant message from Kyra, an enigmatic Goth who seems to be the only witness to the violence he endures, and the two form a cagey, charged friendship. Unlike Daniel Ehrenhaft's Drawing a Blank (2006), in which a young comics fan embarks on a wild, fantastical adventure, Lyga's debut novel is a darkly comic, realistic, contemporary story of bullying and a teen's private escape in artistic pursuits. Fanboy entertains plenty of violent thoughts. He carries a bullet, keeps a tally of his abusers ("The List"), and lashes out with sometimes-cruel remarks, which feel sharply authentic. The insider comics details will slow some readers, and the open-ended questions about Kyra's personal story will frustrate others. Yet Fanboy's whip-smart, often hilariously sarcastic voice skillfully captures a teenager's growing self-awareness, and adds a fresh, urgent perspective to age-old questions about how young people cope with bullying and their own feelings of helplessness, rage, and being misunderstood as they try to discover themselves.
GillianEngberg. : | distributed by Syndetic Solutions, Inc.: |
|
