I was worried when I started this book that I was entering the world of Jodi Picoult and 19 Minutes all over again. After the first couple chapters, the bullet, and “The List”, I was waiting for the shooting to begin. I was hopeful when I read that he would never do that because it wasn’t worth him dying over. But still every time the bullet made it on to the scene or his hatred of the Jock Jerks a.k.a. the JJs were mentioned my stomach would tighten. I was worried about all the way to end and the playground scene with Kyra. And the terrorist fantasies did not help at all. It seemed like danger and darkness was lurking on almost every page of this book. Luckily for me, it never turned as dark as I thought it would.
Overall, I liked the book despite feeling nervous through most of it. Fanboy was an interesting character that had moments of feeling real. It was interesting how he could have so much self confidence when it came to his studies and comics, but would turn into a puddle of goo when challenged by a bully and not do stop the situation. He could be really quick and cruel and then a few pages later be really scared and quiet. I found it all kind of fascinating. I would sometimes get the feeling from him that if was too hard or too unknown that he would just shut down and hide. This would kind of irritate me. I just wanted to reach into the book and smack him. There were a couple times that I almost couldn’t feel bad for him, because I felt like he didn’t help himself and would make things worse by not doing anything. I also thought his friendship with Cal seemed too strange to be real (I know it’s fiction). There were things about it that seemed too strange but I think were there to show that even the popular jocks struggled to be their true selves and that the society of high school can stifle anyone and everyone.
I also went and checked out the web site for this book hoping to gain more insight and closure to a book that left me lacking in both departments. The book seems to have a really big following and the teens that posted on the site seem to feel a real connection to Barry Lyga and his book. And I found some of the dialog on there from them really interesting. They talked to him like I have heard teens talk to their friends. There doesn’t seem to be that gap where they think of him as an adult. It is like they see him as Fanboy, a teen author trying to figure it out just like they are. I don’t think that I have seen that with any of the other sites of the books we have covered in class yet.
