Badd

February 14, 2011
National Book Award Finalist Tharp's (The Spectacular Now) multi-layered story centers around Ceejay, a brash, defensive, but empathetic 16-year-old, eagerly awaiting the return of her beloved older brother, Bobby, from the war in Iraq, with the expectation that they will skip town together. When Bobby returns early, having been discharged for drug possession, Ceejay's family is disappointed and baffled by his uncharacteristically reckless behavior. Bobby drinks too much, cheats on his girlfriend, and spends most of his time with "Captain Crazy," a local eccentric who lost his own brother in Vietnam and is building an "aero-velocipede" flying sculpture while waging a mental war against negative internal and external forces, which he refers to as the "Nogo Gatu." Ceejay pines for the childhood version of her brother, when they were closely united by their tough reputations and moral fortitude. Without the strong connection to Bobby that helped define her, Ceejay is forced to seek a more autonomous identity, one that may require laying down her own armor. With convincing three-dimensional characters, Tharp paints a sympathetic portrait of the constraints of small town life, the struggles of PTSD, and the challenges of faith. Ages 14–up.

December 15, 2010

Alcohol, weed, fighting and sex are par for the course for Ceejay, except sex is not a big thing personally. Her mentor and close pal, big brother Bobby, has always been in and out of trouble, too. When Bobby is dishonorably discharged from service in Iraq, Ceejay can hardly bear his increasingly self-destructive actions. And she really can't stand that he's palling around with Captain Crazy and Mr. White, a loopy Vietnam-era hippie and a geeky boy, respectively, instead of her. Gradually, though, they help to change both her and Bobby's outlook—but when Mr. White, now her friend, suggests that Bobby may be suffering from PTSD, Ceejay can't bear it. Tharp is not quite as sharp with females as with men (Knights of the Hill Country, 2006, etc.), but he successfully draws Ceejay's intensity and pride, as well as her self-destructive behavior, all of which makes her strut and explains both the love and the fight in her. Allowing Ceejay to be reporter and observer hones the story to essentials without moral judgments interfering. Absorbing and redemptive. (Fiction. YA)

(COPYRIGHT (2010) KIRKUS REVIEWS/NIELSEN BUSINESS MEDIA, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED.)

April 1, 2011

Gr 8 Up-In summer, 2007, tough 16-year-old C.J. gets fired up at any perceived insult toward her older brother Bobby, who is serving in Iraq. When he comes home distinctly changed, her plans and dreams take a fall. It takes the admiration of a new boy in her small Iowa town and the intervention of Captain Crazy, a mentally unstable relic of 1960s hippiedom, to change her ideas of Bobby, herself, and of heroism. Tharp gives a compellingly dim view of small-town life, replete with drinking and driving, drugs, irresponsible sex, overburdened parents, and small-minded residents. C.J. herself isn't the brightest of the batch; the stubbornly narrow streak that Tharp gives his protagonist often comes across as a plot contrivance, as when she flies off the handle at the mere mention of PTSD. Captain Crazy's eccentricities also get far too much page space, pushing the more interesting subplot about C.J. and Bobby's family into a condensed and too-quickly resolved aside. Discounting the unevenness in plot development and oversimplification of the main character, this title offers a tangible sense of place and time and a down-to-earth romance, and could be a welcome addition to high school collections in rural areas boasting many Iraq/Afghan War veterans.-Rhona Campbell, formerly at Washington, DC Public Library

Copyright 2011 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

January 1, 2011
Grades 9-12 Tharp, whose The Spectacular Now (2008) was a National Book Award finalist, delivers a wrenching portrayal of the aftereffects of serving in Iraq. Because the reader must decipher whats wrong with the returning soldier from the point of view of his baffled younger sister, Ceejay, this reads much like psychological suspense. Bobby McDermott has always been his sister Ceejays hero, role model, protector, and even the source of her identity in the outside world. Bobby has always been badd, which Ceejay defines as vast and wild. But he returns, inexplicably early, from Iraq, very much diminished, physically fine but missing something, especially the earlier connection with Ceejay. And his wildness is not so much celebratory as it is sadly reckless and drug induced. Ceejay, now a teen, has to cope with the loss of her life compass and try to find ways to get through to Bobby. This is reminiscent, in its stark honesty, of Tharps other work, and makes a fitting pair with Dana Reinhardts The Things a Brother Knows (2010).(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2011, American Library Association.)