REVIEW: Heck: Where the Bad Kids Go

Title: Heck: Where the Bad Kids Go
Author: Dale E. Basye
ISBN: 9780375840753/Random House
Protagonist: 11-year-old Milton Fauster
Setting: Heck
Young Adult fiction
Rating: DNF

First Line: As many believe, there is a place above and a place below.

As I reported in an earlier article, I had high hopes for this book. Milton and Marlo Fauster are killed in a marshmallow bear explosion and find themselves in an otherworldly reform school with Principal Bea "Elsa" Bubb and teachers like Lizzie Borden and Richard Nixon. But something kept me from buying the book. Have you ever been tempted by the trailer of a new movie only to find that the best parts of the movie were in the trailer? The same thing can happen with books, and that's the type of feeling I had about Basye's book.

A friend succumbed to temptation and bought it. She wasn't too thrilled with it and very graciously lent it to me. I opened it today, hoping I was wrong...but I wasn't. I was almost immediately turned off by the writing style. The author did seem to be attempting to write Jasper Fforde for the youth market, and it just fell flat on its face for me. Perhaps Heck will be someone else's cup of tea, but I know of two people who didn't like the taste.