Going Bovine by Libba Bray

"Going Bovine" is the wild journey of an adolescent boy who contracts Mad Cow Disease. Cameron is a fairly normal boy until he gets sick. Swears some, thinks about girls, and has been known to cut class to smoke pot. When he gets sick he starts seeing all sorts of strange things, including a punk angel named Dulcie.

Duclie appears to Cameron after he's been hospitalized, and she offers him a glimmer of hope. The doctors can't really do much for him other than keep him as comfortable as possible, but Dulcie says there is a cure, but he's going to have to go after it. So Cameron teams up with Gonzo, a dwarf around his age who ended up in the hospital at the same time, and they set off on one crazy road trip.

While the guys travel they get themselves into all sorts of crazy situations. Some of them are fairly normal types of crazy, well normal for boys on the run and a road trip that is (oh yes, and the police are looking for them). Others are incredibly strange, including when they add a Gnome who's possibly the Norse god Baldor to their little group of adventurers!

While I enjoyed the twists and turns of this book, I will warn you, this is an adolescent boy we're talking about, and we are seeing everything through his eyes. There's more swearing and sexual references than I care for. So if you go for the book, head in with your eyes wide open.

A Great and Terrible Beauty by Libba Bray

I'm not sure how I first stumbled upon "A Great and Terrible Beauty" by Libba Bray, but I'm glad I did! It's a different approach to the realm of magic and the fantastic than I often read, but it was a very interesting approach. I look forward to exploring what else this author has written.

In "A Great and Terrible Beauty" we meet Gemma Doyle. She isn't like the rest of the girls at Spence Academy. For one, she's spent most of her life in India, and this is her first time in the "mother country." So for her, many of the things the other girls take for granted are new and strange. On top of that, Gemma has just endured witnessing her mother's murder, which for societal reasons she's supposed to say is death by cholera.

As Gemma slowly begins to make a place for herself at Spence, she also begins to attract supernatural forces. She is lead to a mysterious diary, one that tells of girls not unlike her and her friends, who once wielded great power. There is also a mysterious young man who warns her not to use her new found powers lest all be ruined.

Gemma is young though, and power is attractive, how can she not resist playing with what she has discovered? Especially when she discovers that it allows her to communicate with her dead mother? Her mysterious young man is right though, and danger soon haunts Gemma and her friends. Will they manage to overcome? You'll have to read the book to find out!