Shan – Cirque du Freak

Shan, Darren. Cirque du Freak: a Living Nightmare. New York: Little, Brown & Company, 2001. pp. 257.

The first volume of the Darren Shan/ Cirque du Freak series is the first-person narrative of Darren Shan (not his real name) who got himself into the kind of trouble most kids don’t even have nightmares about. Darren & his best friend Steve sneak out to the forbidden Cirque du Freak; a mysterious freak show that suddenly pops up in their little town. They witness much that is strange at the Cirque du Freak, but the highlight for Darren, a self-professed lover of spiders, is a trained tarantula by the name of Madame Octa. For Darren’s friend Steve, however, Madame Octa’s owner’s is far more fascinating – a vampire! When Darren steals the deadly Madame Octa only to have it bite Steve, Darren is left with a decision; does he let his best friend die, agree to become the vampire’s assistant?!

When I saw Cirque du Freak on this week’s reading list, I knew it would be the title I wanted to review. A few months ago, we showed the movie Vampire’s Assistant as a teen afterschool movie at the library & I was really impressed by it. What surprised me most about the book, however, it that it is written for a much younger audience than I expected. Our library keeps all the Shan books in the YA section; they seem to be popular with older teens & the movie portrays Darren as an older teen. However, in the book, he seems quite a bit younger. The almighty internets disagree about how old he’s supposed to be, but a School Library Journal review places him at age 12.[1] More importantly, the book ‘feels’ like it was written for grade-schoolers. NoveList gives it a lexile range of 650; which translates to a 3^rd to 5^th grade reading level.[2] This threw me a little bit at first; it was simply not what I was expecting. Nevertheless, I really liked the book; I’m definitely going to continue on through the series.

The aforementioned review offers this critique; “this volume is neither as well written nor as compulsively readable as the “Harry Potter” books (Scholastic), though surely J. K. Rowling’s endorsement on the cover will win it a few fans.”[3] While I definitely agree that Shan’s no Harry Potter, I think that the series still has a definite appeal. The author got the idea for the books after reading Goosebumps for the first time, & wanted to write something just as scary, but with more substance.[4] Knowing this, the feel of the books make more sense. I was not the only one who expected a book for an older audience; numerous popular reviews on LibraryThing express a similar surprise to my own, including one by Luxx, whose assertion that “I had to stop and remind myself to consider the intended audience very frequently,” certainly rings true.[5]

I am definitely going to modify the audience to whom I recommend the Shan series to at the library; following the lead of co-workers, I have offered it to many older teens & Twilight fans. While they may still enjoy Cirque du Freak, it’s definitely a better recommendation for kids looking to move up from Goosebumps. Unless my opinion changes by the time I finish with the series, I may put in a recommendation to move it from YA to JFiction.

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[1] Capehart, Timothy, “Cirque du Freak: the Saga of Darren Shan,” School Library Journal, vol. 41, issue 5, pp.159. as found in NoveList. http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=noh&tg=UI&an=081656&site=novelist-live (accessed 25 April 2010).

[2] “Cirque du Freak: the saga of Darren Shan,” NoveList.

http://search.ebscohost.com/login.aspx?direct=true&db=noh&tg=UI&an=081656&site=novelist-live (accessed 25 April 2010).

[3] Capehart

[4] Shan, Darren. “Author Notes,” The Saga of Darren Shan Books. http://www.darrenshan.com/vampires/books/01cirque.html (accessed 25 April 2010).

[5] Luxx, “Cirque du Freak,” LibraryThing, 16 Jan. 2010. http://www.librarything.com/work/220546 (accessed 25 April 2010).

Lyga – The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy & Goth Girl

Lyga, Barry. The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy & Goth Girl. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 2006.

Lyga takes the classic story of nerdy-kid-bullied-at-school & gives it a fresh, modern take. Fifteen-year-old Fanboy is comic book fanatic. He’s been working on a comic for practically his entire life & intends to give it to one of his heroes at the upcoming comic book convention. He forms a tentative friendship with Goth Girl through their mutual outcastishness. Fanboy keeps a list of his tormentors & daydreams of school shootings. Goth Girl is bold & foul-mouthed, but helps teach Fanboy how to stick up for himself.

I enjoyed Fanboy & Goth Girl, but not as much as I thought I would. Fanboy seems authentic enough – I like that he carries a bullet around with him at school & that Lyga wasn’t shy about his Columbine-style machine gun frenzy fantasies. His torment was realistic & painful, too. Goth Girl was also a pretty good character – even if she was a little over-dramatized. I appreciated that much of her was kept a secret; any good Goth Girl should have a few secrets. However, a lot of the interactions & resolutions seemed a bit too scripted; too pat. In addition, Fanboy & Goth Girl seemed just a bit too lonely; it seems like there should have been a bigger cadre of outcasts in their school. They still could have found one another, I just think that Lyga made them seem too much like outcasts without them really being all that extreme.

A Booklist Review describes Fanboy & Goth Girl as a “darkly comic, realistic, contemporary story of bullying and a teen’s private escape in artistic pursuits.”[1] It goes on to applaud Lyga for his “fresh, urgent perspective”[2] on the age-old tale of teens coping with bullying – which I would definitely agree with as the highlight of the book. However, a Publisher’s Weekly review echoes my dissatisfaction with the all-too-easy textbook resolutions, “such as the narrator suddenly making peace with the step-fascist” (Fanboy’s stepfather).[3]

All in all, The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy & Goth Girl was a good read. It would be a great book to recommend to comic book fans, goth fans, geeklit fans (is geeklit a word? – if they enjoyed Geektastic I’m declaring them, & myself, a geeklit fan), or any teen who wants a good read on bullying. It would also serve as a good booktalk in conjunction with a comic book library program.

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[1] “The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy & Goth Girl,” Booklist Reviews. September 2006, no. 1. as found in Baker & Taylor’s Title Source 3. http://ts3b.informata.com/TS3/record.jsp?rn=5&ps=5&fr=0&anc=5&bs=1&fb=0&n=E%3A\webapp\ts3\main\users\ls000149.rec&FirstRec=Y (accessed 3/8/2010).

[2] ibid.

[3] “The Astonishing Adventures of Fanboy & Goth Girl,” Publisher’s Weekly Reviews. October 2006, no. 4. as found in Baker & Taylor’s Title Source 3. http://ts3b.informata.com/TS3/record.jsp?rn=5&ps=5&fr=0&anc=5&bs=1&fb=0&n=E%3A\webapp\ts3\main\users\ls000149.rec&FirstRec=Y (accessed 3/8/2010).