Cameron Smith is a sixteen year old, slightly apathetic, teenager with not much to do in life. After feeling ill and having spasms, he's found to have Creutzfeldt-Jakob, or mad-cow disease, a wasting disease of the brain. As Cameron lies in his hospital bed, his high school doing the requisite pepfest to cheer him up, a strange thing happens. He sees an angel named Dulcie and gains a dwarf roommate named Gonzo. The two head off on an adventure to save the world, barely escaping the hospital as they head from Texas to Florida.
With nods to Don Quixote, Shawshank Redemption, Disney, MTV, Norse mythology and physicists, Bray has created quite the world in a teenage boy's mind. A second reading is pretty much required. As I reached the end, I read slower and slower, trying to extend the outcome of the story. Huge kudos to Libba Bray! She's not riding the Gemma Doyle popularity and skating by on the familiar, but has written with a completely different voice and mind, and done it very well. ( )

Libba Bray manges to write a book about almost everything and pull it off. Let's hope we all learn to live as fully as Cameron does in his head (or a parallel dimension.) ( )

At sixteen years old, Cameron Smith has his whole life ahead of him. That doesn’t mean he knows what he’s going to do with it, but he’s happy enough smoking pot in the school bathroom, going to Eubie’s record shop after school to pick up new Great Tremolo albums, and wishing he could sleep with Staci Johnson. But then Cameron is diagnosed with bovine spongiform encephalopathy – Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease – mad cow disease.

To make a long story semi-short, Cameron, told he must save the world from wormholes, a guy called the Wizard of Reckoning, and find a dude named Dr. X (who has the cure for mad cow disease). So he, a hypochondriac dwarf named Gonzo, and eventually a Viking gnome named Balder set off across the country, following random signs, coincidences, and gut feelings.

In this extreme departure from her debut trilogy, Libba Bray’s new novel Going Bovine pays homage to Don Quixote in a magically realistic cross-country romp. Check out Libba Bray’s website (www.libbabray.com) for cool sites relating to the book – The Great Tremolo, Copenhagen Interpretation, CESSNAB, and a few others. ( )

Wow, was this just weird, like a trippy dream that was really cool as you were experiencing it but you'd never admit to having.

Cameron contracts mad cow disease and his life is, oddly, improved by this fatal diagnosis. He takes a journey to find Dr. X, the scientist who can offer him a cure, and along the way befriends a punk angel, a midget, and a talking gnome.

My main complaint about this book was how little Cameron's character was fleshed out before he started on his insane journey. It wasn't until much later (about 300 pages in) that I started to care about what happened to Cameron and those he'd befriended. ( )

nearly done...

"Going Bovine" is an interesting book that puts me in mind of a crash wherein Terry Pratchett collides with gonzo journalist Hunter S. Thompson, and Stephen Donaldson's Ill-Earth series.

The story, you see, is a funny, insightful one about an unhappy adolescent, Cameron, who comes down with mad cow disease. (Yeah, I know, it would take a genius to make this scenario funny, but Libba Bray is up to the task.)

The Ill-Earth aspect, comes in where as Cam succumbs to the ravages of the prion produced disease he finds himself increasing drawn into another world: One that promises him a cure if only he can find the mysterious Doctor X. Or at least that's what his fairy/angel aid tells him. Finding Doc X however proves rather difficult, so Cameron leaves the hospital with the help of a this-world friend, a hypochondriac dwarf named Gonzo, his angel friend, and a Viking demi-god who he rescues from being a yard gnome.

The adventure leads Cam to reexamines his life, while discovering an alternative reality that gives him hope, while requiring him to abandon his world weariness.

Libba Bray gives the boy and his friends believable voices, and she twists the narrative in and out of the two worlds rather convincingly, much as Thomas Convenant came and went under the influence of leprosy.

His adventures are marvelous, involving another boy, who happens to be a hypochondriac, and a Viking demi-god who he rescues from being a yard gnome.

Talking Points:::
In my opinion, "Going Bovine" is going to be one of those divisive books that polarizes readers. Some people, for example, aren't going to like Cameron, the smart-alec hero who makes sharp, sardonic quips in language some people just aren't going to find all that attractive (I'm talkin' about cursing here); and some people aren't going to 'get' the gallows humor.

On the other hand, the pro-camp is going to laugh their fannies off at the wit and humor that springs from nearly every page. They are going to love the smart, insightful observations about school and life, and they are going to like the off-the-wall novelty that keeps the book from hardly ever being dull.

Now for myself, I fall into the pro-camp. I liked the book, though I have to say that I found it needlessly long. Some of the chapters really never added to the story and towards the end you could have skipped them entirely and not missed out. To prove this, I skipped two chapters, finished the book, and then went back and read them -- no loss.

My other complaint is the ending. Of course, I won't talk about that because I hate spoilers, but I will say that it could have been stronger. If only we had been left with more doubt as to whether Cameron's alternative world was real or not, I think it would have been more fun.

Pam T~
mom and reviewer at BooksForKids-reviews