Going Bovine

From the author of the Gemma Doyle trilogy and The Diviners series, this groundbreaking New York Times bestseller and winner of the Michael L. Printz Award for literary excellence is "smart, funny, and layered," raves Entertainment Weekly.

All 16-year-old Cameron wants is to get through high school--and life in general--with a minimum of effort. It's not a lot to ask. But that's before he's given some bad news: he's sick and he's going to die. Which totally sucks. Hope arrives in the winged form of Dulcie, a loopy punk angel/possible hallucination with a bad sugar habit. She tells Cam there is a cure--if he's willing to go in search of it. With the help of a death-obsessed, video-gaming dwarf and a yard gnome, Cam sets off on the mother of all road trips through a twisted America . . . into the heart of what matters most.

From acclaimed author Libba Bray comes a dark comedic journey that poses the questions: Why are we here? What is real? What makes microwave popcorn so good? Why must we die? And how do we really learn to live?

"A hilarious and hallucinatory quest."--The New York Times

"Sublimely surreal."--People

"Libba Bray's fabulous new book will, with any justice, be a cult classic. The kind of book you take with you to college, in the hopes that your roommate will turn out to have packed their own copy, too. Reading it is like discovering an alternate version of The Phantom Tollbooth, where Holden Caulfield has hit Milo over the head and stolen his car, his token, and his tollbooth. There's adventure and tragedy here, a sprinkling of romance, musical interludes, a battle-ready yard gnome who's also a Norse God, and practically a chorus line of physicists. Which reminds me: will someone, someday, take Going Bovine and turn it into a musical, preferably a rock opera? I want the sound track, the program, the T-shirt, and front row tickets."--Kelly Link, author of Get in Trouble, finalist for the Pulitzer Prize

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496 pages

Average rating: 6.88

8 RATINGS

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Community Reviews

tonyalee
Jul 19, 2023
2/10 stars
Honestly, this one was pretty interesting at first. But at about 50% I was so bored with it and I just couldn't justify finishing.

DNF @ 60%
littlemissalto
Jun 16, 2023
10/10 stars
Libba Bray is absolutely one of my favorite authors, and while I have greatly enjoyed and have been immensely humored and captivated by her writings, this book deserves its own parallel universe to exist in altogether! If you can really stick with the book the whole way through (which isn't too much to ask, seeing as the main character Cameron is such a real and hilarious guy!), then you will definitely find Going Bovine to be an insightful and ingenious, albeit confusing, novel. Despite the prevailing whimsical quality she maintains throughout the novel, Libba really does work some important and thought-provoking lessons into her musings. I would recommend Going Bovine to anyone looking for an amusing, yet meaningful read (and especially to teenagers!)

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