Preston Norton

This book is great!
I literally finished it in 2 days...
I usually don't like books with male teenage characters...because, well a lot of their humor is...teenage boy humor and I can only deal with so much of that. But, this book really talks about bigger issues that go on inside teenagers brains than what a lot of other books I've started portray them as having. I feel like all the characters have depth to them. The "bully" has feelings too, and the 'dushbag' stands up for his sister. The cruel cult leader cares about others. The main villain is just grieving. This book uses modern day things, like cell phones, snap chat, etc, but in a classy way? I don't really know how to describe it. This book is more than what you think it is when you read the blurb.… (mer)

Oh man, I had to listen to a lot of Sufjan to get through this. I enjoyed this a lot! I don't think I'll find it particularly memorable but it did some interesting things with family and some important things with gender and sexuality. Three and a half?
I totally had a moment where I thought it was going to be a huge unreliable narrator thing and Ezra had died in the crash and that I was so clever for figuring it out but alas it was just sleep deprivation on a bus at 4am and I am not really that clever.… (mer)

"Cliff Hubbard is a huge loser. Literally. His nickname at Happy Valley High School is Neanderthal because he's so enormous - 6'6" and 250 pounds to be exact. He has nobody at school and life in his trailer-park home has gone from bad to worse ever since his older brother's suicide. There's no one Cliff hates more than the nauseatingly cool quarterback, Aaron Zimmerman. Then Aaron returns to school after a near-death experience with a bizarre claim: while he was unconscious, he saw God, who gave him a list of things to do to make Happy Valley HIgh suck less. And god said there's only one person who can help: Neanderthal. To his own surprise, Cliff says he's in. As he and Aaron make their way through the List, which involves a vindictive English teacher, a mysterious computer hacker, a decidedly unchristian cult of Jesus Teens, the local drug dealers, and the meanest bully at HVHS, Cliff feels like he's part of something for the first time since losing his brother. But fixing a broken school isn't as simple as it seems, and just when Cliff thinks they've completed the List, he realizes their mission hits closer to home than he ever imagined. Razor sharp, moving, and outrageously funny, NOtDtthU is an unforgettable story of finding your place in an imperfect world" (front flap, book).
An Evergreen Bk Award nominee for 2020... and full of snark, humorous asides involving Quentin Tarantino films, and the meaning of 2001 Space Odyssey, and so much profanity...well, let's just say SOME students will enjoy this story to the hilt because of its irreverent wordplay, including LOTS of four letter words and descriptions of sexual acts... but they'll have to LOVE sarcasm, a key element of Cliff's personality & narration.… (mer)