33 snowfish

Reader response to 33 snowfish by Adam Rapp.

Inside cover reads:
"On the run in a stolen car with a kidnapped baby in tow, Custis, Curl, and Boobie are three young people with troubled pasts and bleak, uncertain futures. As they struggle to find a new life for themselves, it becomes painfully clear that none will ever be able to leave the past behind-- though, for some, redemption is waiting in the unlikeliest of places. Adam Rapp's harrowing story brings us to the depths of humanity and powerfully dramatizes the resilience of the human spirit."

My reaction: caution: plot spoiler!
It's just freaking weird. I initially chose it because of the cover. I love books with interesting covers and catchy, weird names. I had no idea it's contents would be so filthy. Seriously, it's just gross. The man part of the story is told by Custis, a 10 year old "gangsta" street kid who has run away from the foster system and been picked up by some dirty old man named bob motley. The story is told just the way that he speaks. There are often misspellings and mistakes, but he gets his point across just like a typical, street-talking kid would. He teams up with Boobie- the silent one who's about 16 years old. Boobie doesn't say much.... but that's probably due to the fact that he murdered his parents and stole his little brother. Boobie and Curl are in a relationship. Curl is 15 years old and turns tricks for a living. Both Boobie and Curl have VD. So this trio is on the run from the law. In the process, they steal cars, money, burn down a hotel, and live in an abandoned van during a snowstorm. Curl dies by the end of whatever sickness she has, and because of that, Boobie commits suicide. Custis, Curl's body, and the baby are found by a guy named Seldom. After burying Curl, he takes the kids back to his place and genuinely cares for them. Near the very end, Custis becomes suspicious of Seldom, and decides to run away. The best part of the story was the end. Custis decides to stay with Seldom, and the reader is left with a feeling of hope.

GAG. it's just gross though. It's horrible, but probably true, that there are kids out there living like this. Unfortunately, no word nerd seal of approval here, and i would certainly NOT use it in the classroom. I don't even know if i'd recommend it to anyone.  It seems to really be about shock value and a lot of inappropriate things- quite void of transcendentals.

Quotes:

"On top of everything else, Boobie's got the clap"(3). The clap = gonorrhea. This is the first sentence. That's a pretty outstanding hook if you ask me. It grabbed my attention.

"These two rich kids are hiding under this toy maker's shop, and they get lured into this candy truck and wind up at the baron's castle where the child-catcher lives, and they meet up with all these other kids who are hiding under the castle, and some of them was already in the castle, but they escaped and they kept talking all frantic about how they had to pretend that they was like dolls so they wouldn't get caught and that's when Dick Van Dick comes and sings the song" (12). Custis is explaining Chitty Chitty Bang Bang.

"At night we would build fires and eat barbecued beans and watch the lightning bugs do somersaults" (23). What I miss most about Illinois is watching the lightning bugs at night.

"It was like the dark of night had imagined him there" (32).

"But no matter how many different leans I tried Boobie wouldn't look back, so I threw a rock at him. And that's when he did one of the most cold-blooded things I've ever seen: He just caught that rock and stuck it in his pocket like it was a quarter" (33). Curl explaining how she met Boobie.

"Even though Seldom kept saying them prayers, I thought maybe God wouldn't let Curl into heaven cuz he's such a sucker; like she would walk up to that check-in station or that holy tollbooth, and some angel with big black boots would come out and kick her in her ass and throw her off the cloud. and I thought about Boobie again and how they probably wouldn't even let him on the cloud cause of what he done to his parents, how they would just throw a bunch of lightning and sh** at him (137-138)