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Beau, Lee, The Bomb, & Me (2014)

by Mary McKinley(Favorite Author)

2.89 of 5 Votes: 5

ISBN

1617732559 (ISBN13: 9781617732553)

languge

English

genre

Young Adult Fantasy & Science Fiction

publisher

K-Teen

review 1: Rylee is “..not just muffin top fat. Oh, no, no, my friends. I mean I stopped weighing after I reached two hundred and thirty pounds.” Rusty to her classmates, Rylee is tortured every day in the mean way kids can be- kicking her books down the hall, stepping on her hand... Beau comes to Seattle from another state. As a gay student he is also tortured, even beaten up, then blamed for the incident by the homophobic principal. Leonie looks for attention from anyone. Even if it means sexual favors from any boy at school- including her teacher. All feel they are misfits. All are bullied in the extreme.So what do you do? Leave. It's almost winter break anyway. Let's steal the family van and head to San Francisco and Beau’s Uncle Frankie. He’s gay. He’ll ... morehave all the answers. Along the way, we'll steal an abused dog and wax poetic about the Pacific Ocean. Rylee’s voice is a perfect blend of comedic timing and serious observations on the world at large. We love the sassy teen who loves old music groups, and her playlist is in the appendix.There are some historic facts that are untrue, but the tenor and theme are so well done, we overlook them. When Uncle Frankie’s partner says “hella true dat, dude,” the kids say it sounds preposterous. You feel like saying that to Rylee as well: lose the over-stylized language. The second in the series, Rusty Summer, will be out in May of 2015.A word to writers who write about Seattle: please don’t perpetuate the Seattle stereotype of rain and grey every single day. That’s so cliché and just incorrect.
review 2: A GoodReads Giveaway“The first time I thought about killing myself, I was twelve,” says narrator Rylee Winters, now pushing seventeen.She doesn’t think about suicide anymore but she remains hurt, angry and lonesome — an outcast, of sorts, because she is one of “the fat family.”When Beau Gales registers at her school — Baboon High, in Rylee’s mind— she sees him as “fresh meat” for the school bullies to torture, thus taking some of the pressure off her.But Beau turns out to be quite a guy. He has managed to have “forged kindness from the torment he’s faced.”Leonie, nee DuBois, the nominal school slut, completes the trio of misfits — The Misfit Patrol — at the center of this novel……this novel that becomes the story of a road trip from Seattle to San Francisco, essential Beau’s quest to find a place where he feels at home. Beau hopes to find Answers About Life — kinda — from his Uncle Frank.During the trip in Rylee’s mother’s van, the road warriors meet the Bomb. Yes, the Bomb, but I’m not revealing the nature of the Bomb. You’ll have to see for yourself.The saddest line in the book is seen after Leonie [Lee] reveals that her stepfather molested her when she was a little girl: “I can’t even remember that little kid…the little girl I was.”That is a heart-wrenching line, eh b’ys?This novel is fun to read even though some of its pages are a smidgen preachy. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. Sometimes a little needed sermonizing kicks butt.Oh, another thing; you’ll hear tell of — and hear — some great music in this book, not the least of which is Uncle Oscar’s rendition of “Somewhere over the Rainbow”. less

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