Going Bovine, Libba Bray
Going Bovine, Libba Bray
List: $25.00 | Sale: $17.50
Club: $12.50

Going Bovine

Author: Libba Bray

Narrator: Erik Davies

Unabridged: 15 hr 9 min

Format: Digital Audiobook Download

Published: 09/22/2009


Synopsis

From the author of the Gemma Doyle trilogy and The Diviners series, this groundbreaking New York Times bestseller and winner of the Michael L. Printz Award for literary excellence is "smart, funny, and layered," raves Entertainment Weekly.

All 16-year-old Cameron wants is to get through high school—and life in general—with a minimum of effort. It’s not a lot to ask. But that’s before he’s given some bad news: he’s sick and he’s going to die. Which totally sucks. Hope arrives in the winged form of Dulcie, a loopy punk angel/possible hallucination with a bad sugar habit. She tells Cam there is a cure—if he’s willing to go in search of it. With the help of a death-obsessed, video-gaming dwarf and a yard gnome, Cam sets off on the mother of all road trips through a twisted America . . . into the heart of what matters most.

From acclaimed author Libba Bray comes a dark comedic journey that poses the questions: Why are we here? What is real? What makes microwave popcorn so good? Why must we die? And how do we really learn to live? 

"A hilarious and hallucinatory quest."—The New York Times

"Sublimely surreal."—People

"Libba Bray's fabulous new book will, with any justice, be a cult classic. The kind of book you take with you to college, in the hopes that your roommate will turn out to have packed their own copy, too. Reading it is like discovering an alternate version of The Phantom Tollbooth, where Holden Caulfield has hit Milo over the head and stolen his car, his token, and his tollbooth. There's adventure and tragedy here, a sprinkling of romance, musical interludes, a battle-ready yard gnome who's also a Norse God, and practically a chorus line of physicists. Which reminds me: will someone, someday, take Going Bovine and turn it into a musical, preferably a rock opera? I want the sound track, the program, the T-shirt, and front row tickets."—Kelly Link, author of Get in Trouble, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize

About The Author

Libba Bray is the author of the New York Times bestselling Gemma Doyle Trilogy, which comprises the novels A Great and Terrible Beauty, Rebel Angels, and The Sweet Far Thing. She has written short stories about everything from Cheap Trick concerts to The Rocky Horror Picture Show devotees to meeting Satan worshippers on summer vacation. Libba lives in Brooklyn, New York, with her husband, son, and two cats. Her dream is to stop sucking so badly at drums in Rock Band. You may visit her at www.libbabray.com, and you don’t even have to call first.


Reviews

Goodreads review by Barry on May 31, 2009

I'm biased, of course. Libba's not just my client, she's my wife. But this is one of the funniest books I've ever read, and will break your heart at the same time. She wrote the first draft of this book in one month, for a workshop organized by Cynthia Leitich Smith. It just poured out of her, and I......more

Goodreads review by Thomas on December 20, 2010

Sixteen year old Cameron Smith confidently states that the best day of his entire life was when he was a toddler and his family visited Disney Land. During that day he almost got himself killed in a freak drowning accident. Already it is evident of Cameron's mindset, or the teenage group he fits int......more

Goodreads review by Kat Kennedy on August 16, 2010

Okay, here's my review: It started out good although very reminiscent of a modern-day Holden Caulfield. Then it went really psychedelic. Then I finished it and found something else to read. Great concept - just kind of average execution.......more

Goodreads review by Snotchocheez on June 28, 2016

Somewhat apt analogy here: Libba Bray hanging out with the stoners and miscreants in the high school bathroom, some with little more on their mind than escaping the mundane world by getting high and wadding up the the institutional cheap-ass paper towels, getting them wet and hurling the gluey muck......more

Goodreads review by Chelsea on April 11, 2017

I really wanted to love this, but honestly this was the weirdest book I've ever read, and I once read a book where the main character could listen to Justin Timberlake's music and literally transport herself into a realistic sex scene with him. So there's that. While there were a lot of things about......more


Quotes

"Libba Bray not only breaks the mold of the ubiquitous dying-teenager genre—she smashes it and grinds the tiny pieces into the sidewalk. For the record, I'd go anywhere she wanted to take me."—The New York Times

"Offer this to fans of Douglas Adams's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy seeking more inspired lunacy."—Publishers Weekly, Starred Review

"An unforgettable, nearly indefinable fantasy . . . wholly unique, ambitious, tender, thought-provoking, and often fall-off-the-chair funny."—Booklist, Starred Review

"Readers will have a great time."—The Horn Book

"It's a trip worth taking."—SLJ

"Here's one book about dying that has a wicked sense of humor."—The Denver Post

"A laugh-out-loud tear-jerking fantastical voyage into the meaning of what is real in life."—VOYA

"A very messed-up book, but in a good way. . . .Hilarious, random, surreal and thought-provoking."—Guys Lit Wire

One of Entertainment Weekly's 8 Great Road-Trip Books
*
Winner of the Michael L. Printz Award 

Publishers Weekly Best Book of the Year
An Indie Next Pick
A Booklist Books for Youth Editors' Choice
An ALA Best Book for Young Adults
A Chicago Public Library Best of the Best book
A New York Public Library Book for the Teen Age


Awards

  • Printz Awards