Review Detail

Reader reviewed by Mairi

Abel Dandy grew up in the circus as the child of, well, freaks, but he's perfectly normal- a mixed blessing. On one hand, the other circus performers are there because they couldn't get along in the outside world. Abel, on the other hand, has never had a chance to make it anywhere else, and his lack of oddities makes it clear that he will not make it in the circus, either.

I decided to read this book for absolutely no other reason than that I liked the cover- not the one for the hardcover (which is rather ugly) but the one for the paperback, which is drawn in an almost manga- like style and features Abel accompanied by the strange woman of whom he dreams. It also has one of the better first lines I've ever read. That line, "When a boy's first romantic interlude is with Phoebe the Dog-Faced Girl, he feels a need to get out into the world and find a new life," basically sums up the book for me- we get that, for Abel, an ugly freak girl is the same as any ugly girl, but we know that she is not and feel bad for her.

When I told a friend I was reading this book, she looked at me and said, "Good Lord, is that as offensive as it sounds?" and I do have to say that the conjoined twins and the giants and the dwarves in this book are all played for laughs.