Be careful what you wish for. Isn't that what they always say? It's not until now though that Tom fully appreciates the warning. He has dreamt about being whisked away to some magical fantasy land or parallel universe on countless occasions, so when it actually happened, when he was told that he, plain old boring Tom Parking, is the Chosen One in the prophecy to restore the "Kingdom", he can't wait to see this place.

It didn't take long to lose all the excitement because: a). the Kingdom is made from garbage from Earth and b). everyone is depressing and the King hates him. So, Tom does the smart thing: he says "no, thank you" and goes back home.  Forget about it.

Until he finds out his best friend Kyle is now the Chosen One. Not only that, Kyle is making things work. He has even acquired magical powers. What? No one says anything about magical powers.

A story about an unlikely and reluctant hero who figures out how to take on responsibility and focus on the important things in life. Tom and Kyle are both very likable characters and sometimes it's hard to find a book where you get to read about just a bunch of normal guys. The target audience for this book will find the story quite amusing and funny I think.

Recommend The Magic Kingdom of Landover series by Terry Brooks when they finish this one, starting with Magic Kingdom for Sale. Sold!

John Dies at the End felt very much like a book that was written in pieces without a particular goal in mind, with weird episodic sections that didn't always tie together too neatly.  This Book is Full of Spiders: Seriously Dude, Don't Touch It comes together much more tightly, with a plot that's (mostly) coherent and character motivations that make a little more sense.

After the events of the previous novel, things haven't really settled down much in the town of "Undisclosed".  It's still a terrible town, with nothing much to recommend it.  David and John still are useless layabouts.  Only now, and infestation of weird spider-like parasites are taking over and zombifying people.  With humans mutating into super-killers and a government unable to quell the fears of the nation, the infected are quarantined in the hospital where they think the outbreak began.  Obviously David and John know better.

This book is slightly less insane than the first, but what it loses in crazy it picks up with a better story, even if it feels like a messed up comedy version of the Walking Dead.  There are still the swears and the reference to drug use as in the first, but it feels tamer, more accessible.  You certainly need to have read the first book to understand why John and David are special, and why David's dog Molly seems unusually clever.

See also our review on the first book Hold Me Closer, Necromancer.


Oh, how nice it is to see Sam and the gang in action again. What I love most about this series is the cast, so I am happy to read about them doing just about anything and eavesdrop on their conversation.

There is a good story in the sequel Necromancing the Stone too of course. Now that Sam has killed the evil Douglas, he has to adjust to his new life as he takes Douglas' place on the magical council as the necromancer. Unsure of his power and guilty about the changes he's caused in his friends (after all, one of them has been turned into a ghost and the other a werebear), he is not feeling any love either from the magical council, his girlfriend's entire clan, not even the garden gnomes in his new mansion.

When a mysterious murder happens, everyone is looking towards Sam to prove himself by finding the killer, and he better does it quickly, since the evidence all points to the victim dying at the hands of a necromancer. Now, wait a second, isn't Sam the only necromancer left?
Yes, he is.

As crazy as Necromancing the Stone sounds, with a full ensemble of any paranormal creatures you can imagine (and some you never dream of), the book is ultimately about a boy growing up, being thrown into a strange world of responsibility, and trying to do the right thing.  McBride's writing is plenty funny and witty and the dialogue is spot on, and yes, there is swearing but never excessive. The additions of James the house spirit and Minion round up an already charming cast. You'll smile when you figure out who Minion is supposed to be.

Visit Lish McBride's website and follow @TeamDamnation on Twitter.

And what do you guys think of the redesigned covers?

Last we heard from Samuel Johnson, he's foiled Mrs. Abernathy's plan to open the portal for the Great Malevolence and his demon army to invade the world. Now Samuel, with all that craziness behind him, is trying to psych himself up and ask a girl out, though he can't see quite well so instead, he's asking a letterbox if she wants to go on a date.
Samuel may have gone back to his normal life, but he's not forgotten. Oh no. Far from it. Down in the Infernals, Mrs. Abernathy, who has lost all her clout with her fellow demons, is stewing and plotting revenge.  She is going to drag Samuel down to her territory this time. But have no fear, Samuel has his loyal dachshund Boswell, and a new cast of helpers: two cops, an ice-cream man and a traveling troupe of elves (who are really dwarfs).
Just like The Gates, The Infernals will delight readers who are looking for funny, adventure, wit, and some great friendships.  The characters are just priceless, and Terry Pratchett fans will be glad to see the same quality footnotes from Connolly.  This continues to be a great series for teens who are looking for something smarter than the usual fare.

There is a certain type of person out there that gets really worked up when grammatical rules are broken or bent.  Years back, Lynne Truss had a breakout hit with Eats, Shoots, and Leaves, a book that demonized bad grammar, poor punctuation, and general awkward phrasing.  Those Grammar Avengers ate it up, but they weren't all adults: these people start young.  Heck, when I was in high school, me and my buddies were very much like this, and some might say I still am.

For a certain type of boy, language books like this are actually a lot of fun.  A recent example stands out as a fascinating tale of grammar-hunting gone mad:  The Great Typo Hunt, by Jeff Deck and Benjamin D. Herson.  In a trip across the US and a brief sojourn into Canada, the authors and friends seek out and attempt to correct grammar errors in signs, posters, and billboards.  They explore shopping malls, restaurants, government offices and national monuments, making whatever corrections they can, and not all changes are welcome.

Other books on grammar and poor application of language are the novelty book series "Signspotting".  These are collections of signs from around the world that are, misspelled, badly translated, or just weird.  engrish.com and failblog.org also feature such uses and abuses of language.  These are along the same lines as F in Exams.

There's plenty more out there, too.  Just check out any facebook post.

I read it, but I don't know if I liked it.  Heck, I'm not sure that over the course of the book if I ever really figured out what was going on.  Nevertheless, I would still recommend it for those guys who can handle rough language and weird situations.

John Dies In the End is the story of David Wong, a young man who happens to gotten involved with mysterious dark forces seeking to take over our world.  First, it seems like a simple case of a few hauntings and vision he sees after ingesting some weird soy sauce-type stuff.  But then it gets weird.  Lovecraftian weird.  His dog explodes, but comes trotting up merrily afterwards.  A trip to a self-improvement guru in Vegas ends up with him and his buddies dressed as the band "Elton John" and a vortex sucking in a bunch of people who turn out to never have existed.

Possible dimensional travel, demons and a monster called "Korrok" all mix together and leave a confusing trail of oddities.  I can't say it all makes sense, but it's an entertaining enough read, with the author bring a fair amount of irreverence, much like his work on Cracked.com, which I've referenced a couple of times before, and of which David Wong is the senior editor.

A sequel is due out in October called This Book is Full of Spiders: Seriously Dude, Don't Touch It.

It will eventually be released as a film that will likely become a cult hit.

Samuel Johnson just wants to take more advantage of the whole Halloween business by trick or treating a few days earlier than everyone else. He never would have thought he would witness the opening of the Gates of Hell at his neighbour's house at 666 Crowley Avenue.

The Abernathys, aka the neighbours, just want to have a fun evening by pretending to contact the dead. They never intend to summon the one and only Great Malevolence himself.

Of course, it can't be that easy to open a portal between us and the Underworld, but a group of scientists in Switzerland have made a particle accelerator in the hopes of recreating the Big Bang, and just at the right time, something "escapes" from it and creates an opportunity. Thanks!



Samuel tries to tell his mom about what he saw at the Abernathys, but of course she doesn't believe him.  When will adults ever learn? Now demons, monsters, unpleasant things in general, are taking over the human world, trying to pave the way for the Great One, but humans are not going down without a fight.

John Connolly is most famous for his Charlie Parker detective series. This standalone novel is in the adult section of my library, but the whole time I'm reading it I feel like this can be an older kids'/teen book, and it looks like it's been re-released as such just a few months ago. The Gates is a lot of fun to read, complete with cheeky footnotes and over-the-top characterizations. The demons' naivety, like Nurd's first experience in a Porsche and encounter with the police, is rather amusing. Other reviews have pointed out the humour in this is quite similar to Hitchhiker's Guide or Christopher Moore or Neil Gaiman, and I think those are all fair comparisons. As my co-worker, who recommended this book to me, pointed out, you need to be able to accept and like strange and twisted things to enjoy this book.

Anyone out there read his crime novels? What do you think of them? Leave us a comment.

Terry Pratchett is a well-established English fantasy writer whose most famous work is the Discworld series.  Neil Gaiman is a bit of a literary Renaissance Man whose dabbles in a little bit of everything, from children's picture books to dark comics to fiction, all of it with a bit of a grim, Tim Burton-esque quality.  The two don't really strike me as particularly similar, aside from both being English and therefore having the British dry humour, but they blend seamlessly here.

Good Omens was published way back in 1990, when both writers were on the ascendant (have either come down yet?).   The story of the approaching End Times, we learn that the Antichrist everyone is expecting was switched at birth and is in fact a regular 11-year-old boy.  Also involved are various parties trying to hasten or prevent the end of the world are the remaining Four Horsemen (Pestilence retired at the advent of antibiotics), an angel and a demon (not your modern kind with the sullen expressions and pining for love, but the real classic versions.  Bad people.)  The plot is a bit tough to nail down, but if you've read either author's work, it a bit like that.

There are different versions, one American and one British, with mostly minor differences, and you should note that this cover I have posted is just one of many.  Good for boys comfortable with complicated plots, the story has plenty of jokes and Terry Pratchett's trademark footnotes to lighten the mood.

Dalton Rev is a private detective who solves cases for anyone who can pay. And that's how he ends up at Salt River High, investigating an alleged suicide involving a body strung up with duct tape. With his Private Dick Handbook full of helpful guidelines (e.g. Rule #7: The weaker the play, the weaker the bluff. Also, never trust a redhead) and his extensive knowledge of all the Lexington Cole mystery novels (a detective series that Dalton uses as an instruction manual), Dalton is sure he will get to the bottom of the mystery. All he has to do is survive masked snipers, an evil principal, murderous cliques and his mom's curfew.
This is a satirical noir mystery, whose characters and language remind me the Dick Tracy comics and films (except set in a modern day high school). There are plenty of references to classic hard-boiled mysteries and movies (e.g. there's a mysterious guy named Elisha Cook) and some really over the top statements (e.g. "It's not complicated. Add killer, subtract body, solve for x. What can I say? It's a career."). I found some of the writing pretty funny -- especially whenever Dalton finds himself in complicated situations and recalls lines from his Lexington Cole novels: "In Forty Leagues Under Berlin, Lex Cole had been trapped in a German pillbox with nothing but a spoon. In Right Cross, Mob Boss, he'd fought off a gang of hopped-up Zoot Suiters with a leather wing tip. Neither scenario was much help now".
This isn't one of those nail-biting thrillers, but it does have lots of dialogue that keeps the story moving. I think those who are a little more familiar with hard-boiled mysteries/movies and appreciate parodies might enjoy this.

Would you rather have mayonaise tears or Kool-Aid sweat? Have multiple lives like a video game player in Donkey Kong or multiple weapons as in Halo? Your dad be Hulk Hogan or Gandalf?

Would you Rather...? by Justin Heimberg and David Gomberg contains 1500 dilemmas like these. They range from questions about appearance, to sex, to superhero powers. (and some are so random, they don't fit into any kind of category at all.) It's a pretty ridiculous and, some may argue, pointless book, but it's also one of those strangely addictive ones where you can't help reading the next page. This is partly due to the fact that it's so easy to read -- there are only two to three questions per page and you can open the book and start reading at any page. Cartoons and drawings can be found throughout the book and the questions are divided into different categories (e.g. celebreties and pop culture, Extremely painful and extremely fatal). In addition to the "would you rather" questions, there are the "Would you..." questions (e.g. Would you accept the power to fly in exchange for weighing 500 pounds?) and travel games (e.g. car bingo where you have to look for people doing strange things in their cars).
If you have a teen looking for a quick read on the weird and gross side, this just might be thing to recommend.

Heimberg and Gomberg have written quite a few other Would you Rather books with different themes (Doubly Disgusting, Dirty, etc.) and Heimberg is the author of some of the Worst Case Scenario handbooks.

Here's another book that will probably make parents and teachers cringe. A step by step instruction manual on making projectiles, catapults, and other wonderful artillery from materials available to any teen -- elastic bands, pencils, string, paper clips and the like.
My favourites are the "claymore mine" that fires candy shrapnel and the Ping Pong Zooka that shoots flaming ping pong balls. (I am seriously tempted to try these projects out...) The book also includes instructions on how to cut out the pages of a book and turn it into a secret hiding place for your weaponry and well as how to make alien and zombie targets. The detailed diagrams accompanying the instructions make it easy to put these projects together. I think this is another one of those great novelty books that will appeal to teen guys (not to mention adults). Besides, what better way to keep yourself occupied during a boring class than make crossbows with rubber bands and pens? (disclaimer: I am not endorsing the use of projectiles in the classroom)

David Thorne might be insane. Billed as a humorist on the back of the book, he is apparently a graphic designer from Australia, but reading this, he doesn't seem to like to do any actual work; instead, he prefers to harangue his co-workers and his clients. He seems to be able to get away with some pretty cruel and unusual stuff, including taunting the police, creating a mocking missing poster for someone's cat, trying to pay an overdue fee with a drawing of a spider, and giving his boss grief over every little request.

Today a boy at the library asked me for the book "Five Very Good Reasons to Punch a Dolphin in the Mouth and Other Useful guides". I immediately made a mental note to put a hold on this item myself -- I mean, who wouldn't be at least slightly intrigued by the title? To my disappointment our library did not own the item, but fortunately it was available through interlibrary loan.
It seems like there are plenty of these kind of books around these days -- humorous, satirical non-fiction -- or perhaps a better term might be "novelty books", as the aim of these books is often just to amuse the reader, rather than offer any kind of in depth information or story. They range from blog books (e.g. I Can Has Cheezeburger? A LOLcat Collekshun - cat photos with funny captions) to parodies (e.g. 101 Places Not to See Before you Die) to slang dictionaries (e.g. Mo Urban Dictionary). My favourites feature everyday blunders, such as F in Exams (funny exam answers people actually wrote) Cake Wrecks: When Professional Cakes Go Hilariously Wrong and Passive Aggressive Notes: painfully polite and hilariously hostile writings. These are the kind of books that your strict English teacher would never let into her classroom -- much less even consider as a book. They're the kind of material that librarians have purchase for the library in secret, in case someone tells them that library funds should be used more "wisely". They are also the kinds of books that draw the interest of just about anyone because of their bizarre topics and edgy (often deviant) perspectives. Some we might read with disgust or morbid fascination, but I find it's almost impossible for me to resist at lest flipping through such books. I say we stop worrying so much about literary merit and let those boys find out what the five good reasons are to punch a dolphin.

I think a lot of us wish there were more books like the Wimpy Kid series by Jeff Kinney. So when I heard that this new book was the "Wimpy Kid for high schoolers" I was definitely interested in taking a look at it.
Larkin Pace is a very ordinary 14 year-old dealing with the usual bullies at school, a bratty, spoiled older sister and confusing relationships with girls. Like Greg in the Wimpy Kid series, he has a best friend, Freddie, who is pretty clueless and socially awkward. There are some funny parts -- Freddie who wears his bedroom slippers to school, Larkin's plans to impress Steven Spielberg and Ron Howard with his movie ideas about shampoo girls, and Larkin's attempts to impress the girls at the school dance by wearing multiple shirts under his regular one to make himself look bigger.
I didn't find it as funny or as natural as Wimpy Kid -- and parts of the storyline were pretty cliche. The illustrations and font didn't have the fun cartoon feel either. But to be fair, reading this after Wimpy Kid probably affected my perceptions...

This is the grandpappy of books for teen boys. I read this one when I was 12 or 13, and I'm not sure how I got my hands on it. Maybe it found me. I don't know. I do know that I loved it, and it opened a whole new world for me, and that it really kickstarted my adult reading and helped form my tastes from then on, from movies to TV, and obviously reading. The absurd humor, the off-point ramblings, the made up facts from the Guide to the memorable tag line "Don't Panic", it was perfect.

Twelve-year-old Oliver Watson pretends to be the dumb kid -- but he is in fact a genius who has made himself rich and is plotting his way to world domination. When Oliver’s father — and archnemesis — brags about winning his middle school election, Oliver decides to spite his dad by proving that anyone -- even himself-- can win a class election. Since he isn't exactly the most popular kid in his class, he resorts to intimidation, bribery, and blackmail... A funny read with lots of pranks, (darts that give gas, chemicals that give colds and rashes, letting the air out of tires), a kidnapping, bombs and violent dodgeball.

Junior is a 14 year-old teen living on an Indian reserve in Spokane. Life is hard and dysfunctional -- his father is an alcoholic, his sister has run away and he is regularly bullied. When his teacher urges him to find a better life by leaving the reservation, junior decides to enroll in a high performing, wealthy, all-white high school, where the only other Indian is the school mascot. Despite the racism and social stigma, Junior eventually finds himself making friends with both geeky and popular students and starting on the basketball team.
While the narration by Junior is sarcastic and funny -- filled with self depreciating humor, witty comments and cartoons (drawn by Junior), the focus here are issues of prejudice, marginalization, friendship, with very serious events such as suicide, sister dying in a fire, grandma killed by drunk driver.

When you didn't spend the time cramming for your test, and your mind starts humming tweedle dee dee, be creative. That's what all these students featured in this book did.
What type of attractive force or bond holds the sodium ions and chloride ions together in a crystal of sodium chloride?
James Bond.
Name six animals which live specifically in the Arctic.
Two polar bears and four seals.
The book also offers some funny spelling mistakes students made, like
What happens during puberty to a boy?
He says goodbye to his childhood and enters adultery.
Name one measure which can be put into place to avoid river flooding in times of extensive rainfall (e.g. in Mississippi).
...by placing a number of big dames into the river. 
Well, full points to the students for coming up with great answers, but when you look at some of the questions, they're just asking for it.  
Perfect little book for those who are not crazy about traditional reading but need something for silent reading (whether you can remain "silent" when reading this book is another matter).

You may over the course of reading this and future posts come to find that I like trivia books. If there is one thing about me that hasn't changed since I was 14, it is that. I've always loved trivia books, games, and just spouting off random facts. I know that this is true for me, obviously, but I know there are a lot of other teenage guys out there who want the same thing, particularly the nerdy and geeky kind.

People ask me where I learn all this nonsense. Trivia books obviously, and this is one of the better ones.

Cracked.com is the rebirth of an old magazine that itself was a knockoff of MAD, but it has vastly improved (though it is, ahem, mature: swears and PG-13 adult content beware). This book compiles a bunch of lists like the ones on the website, all true. For example:

• Important discoveries made well on drugs: Discoverer of DNA was high on LSD when he though of it
• Insane weapons planned in WWII: Giant solar beam mirrors in space!
• Bugs in our food (on purpose no less): Jelly beans are coated with bugs!

This isn't just random trivia; it's hilarious random trivia.