The old wizard is as disreputable in his own way as Conn is. Twenty years ago, Nevery was accused of attempting to kill the Duchess of Wellmet where Conn lives. Nevery was run out of town just ahead of the soldiers that would have doubtlessly hung him.

Now, twenty years later, Nevery is drawn back to the city because the magic that powers the place is mysteriously drying up. Nevery uses that predicament to leverage his own return and gets the Duchess to grant him amnesty for his past wrongs, even though he didn’t try to kill her.

I love the way Prineas has Wellmet sectioned off into Twilight, Dusk House, Dawn Palace, and the other regions. Illustrator Antonio Javier Caparo’s maps and drawings really established the tone well and led my son and me into a wonderful imaginary journey throughout the city. The place just feels real.

The relationship between the characters, though predictable because they are steeped in tradition, are even more wonderful because the reader knows what to expect. Prineas expertly moves those relationships along, teasing the reader with them. I kept wanting Nevery to acknowledge Conn as his apprentice for so long, then – when Conn was in such dire straits – I’d forgotten about it and Prineas delivered that so expertly that I knew it was coming and was so concerned about other things that I’d temporarily forgotten.

That relationship, that push/pull of wills and the need to understand each other, drives this book and I’m sure will drive the other two in this trilogy. The addition of Benet as the hired muscle and his – eventual – doting uncle role with Conn is amazingly portrayed as well.

I have to admit that the first few pages seemed to dawdle a bit, but this is a relatively big world to explore, and there’s some history – particularly between the major players – that has to be revealed slowly. Prineas makes the whole thing play well, and it isn’t long before she has everything up and running.

Along with all the mystery and intrigue, as well as the duplicitous and suspicious nature of the characters, the author also throws in one-liners that and humor that is to die for. One of the best scenes in the book was when Conn was captured by the duchess’s guards, thrown into a prison cell, then lets himself out with his Lockpicking skills. Only to give himself away when he gladly hails Nevery, whom he hadn’t expected to see at all.

When Prineas locks onto the final scenes of the book, about the last sixty pages so be prepared to keep reading for a bit, there’s just no way to tear yourself free. My son and I were nailed to the pages, pushing way past our bedtimes as we finished up the last one hundred and forty pages in a reading marathon that had us hanging on by our fingernails.

The Magic Thief ends well, resolving several questions, but it raises several others that will keep my son and I anxiously awaiting the next installment. This is definitely a book to pick up for the kids to read over the summer, and you may find yourself chasing Conn and Nevery through Strangle Street and avoiding the Underlord’s minions yourself!

The popularity of zombies is on the rise. In fact, the fans of the walking dead may be soon encroaching on the number one spot held by vampires. I don’t know why this is happening, it’s as mysterious as the reasons for the zombies climbing from their graves to start searching for a brain buffet in all the movies (and yeah, yeah, I get that some kind of gas was released in the Living Dead movies and in Raccoon City, but come on. Really?).

Zombies moved back into horror fiction with a much more sure step than they’ve had in a long time. But now they’re launching into teen romance fiction. In a way. Generation Dead by Daniel Waters is a mixed bag, and I’m going to be all over the place while describing my reading experience for you. It just refuses to lie down and die to be reborn into a familiar zombie novel of movie tradition.

The cover of the dead cheerleader with blackened eyes seized me at once. I mean, once you get that image in your head, it’s not going to easily go away. Neither will the romantic triangle between Phoebe, Adam, and Tommy, the “differently biotic” boy Phoebe falls for.

Phoebe was one of the Goth girls at school. She enjoyed being different, and the dressed-in-black thing really worked for her. Looking like the living dead really worked for her. It even earned her the name Scarypants from Pete, the novel’s villain of sorts. Of course, the look really lost its appeal when dead kids started showing up and coming back to school. The author does an excellent job of catching a teen girl’s feelings and confusion throughout the novel. Phoebe comes to life on the pages almost at once.

Adam is the football jock and Phoebe’s next door friend. As it happens, he’s just discovering that the friendship he’s always had with Phoebe runs much deeper. That realization is stymied by his own shyness, the fact that he is a member of the Pain Crew on the football team and he shouldn’t go for Goth girls, and Phoebe’s sudden crush on Tommy Williams.

Tommy is a pioneering wonder among the zombies. He’s articulate and he writes, blogs even. He also goes out for the football team and causes all kinds of tension in the school and the city.

The story revolves around these three characters and how they sort out their lives. However, the author throws in great support characters like Margi, Phoebe’s best friend, and others.

Teens these days seem to be almost shockproof to so many changes in their lives. If the living dead did claw their way from their graves and decide to go to school instead of the brain buffet, I would be very surprised if teens didn’t act exactly as Waters portrays them in this novel. They split almost immediately into groups that supported the zombies and those that stood against. But mostly they were curious.

I could make a lot of comparisons to cultural differences being played out in the pages, of Waters building his zombies up to comment on race, religion, and economics – the usual dividers among populations, but I won’t. I don’t think he wants the book to go that deeply into global problems. I believe he just wants to talk about the teen world, get into their heads, and tell a story they’ll have a ball with wondering “what-if”?

I also have to admit that you’re going to have to push yourself to get through the first fifty pages or so. The book progresses slowly but that’s so the characters and all their complications can be set into place. Once that’s done, Waters engages fully with the story and keeps things moving.

This is a book for the teens. Some parents of teens or those who want a trip back through the teenage years will enjoy it as well, but the junior high and high school readers should eat this one up. There’s no real explanation for why the zombies came back to life, or why only American teens were affected, and I was disappointed slightly in that. But the characters are real, facing situations with genuine emotion, and I believe that the target audience is going to feel that and enjoy the read.

 Jordan Dane hits a solid homerun with her debut novel, No One Heard Her Scream. The book is marked as romantic suspense, but the accent is on suspense, with clearly defined characters, a taut plot, and forensic and police terminology that will satisfy the armchair crime scene investigators looking for a new buzz.

The novel’s pacing is frantic, the prose pared down and swift, the love scenes torrid, and the bad guys as creepy and evil as anyone would ever want. I had a good time blazing through this book. It offers a lot of excitement and twists, as well as the San Antonio background that I’d recently visited. The scenes along the historic riverwalk really jumped out at me.

I liked Detective Rebecca “Becca” Montgomery right out of the blocks. She’s cut from the same larger-than-life cloth that a lot of action/suspense heroes are cut from, but she wears it well. I liked the fact that she was tough, independent, and good in a fight, though that isn’t what most romance heroines are noted for. However, more and more young women in our world are getting that way – including familiarity with the martial arts – and I think Becca presents a good role model in several respects.

Dane grabs our attention immediately in the beginning with the short action piece, then segues smoothly into Becca’s story. Still reeling with the guilt and pain from her younger sister’s disappearance months ago, Becca is pulled off Dani’s investigation and placed on a cold case assignment. Along the way she’s hauled into an investigation involving the body of a young woman that was bricked up in a recently burned-down movie theater.

While at the theater crime scene, Becca crosses paths with Diego Galvan, who quickly proves he’s more than he seems. Diego is a strong lead that easily holds his own with Becca, and he’s a man hiding a lot of secrets.

Real life has to be squashed almost into sound bytes in a novel to keep the pacing up, and Dane masters that art easily. Her strength lies in the plotting, which has enough twists and turns to keep most readers guessing or second-guessing which path she’s going to take.

With the meteoric pacing of Becca’s investigation, the budding relationship with Diego sometimes gets overshadowed, but I found myself accepting the fact that the author would handle it. My main attention focused on Becca’s pursuit of the bad guys and who everyone really was. The headlong storyline made it almost impossible to let the relationship breathe, but I think it’ll be satisfying to romance fans.

However, the suspense, action, and detailed police knowledge should have fans of Tami Hoag and Lisa Jackson picking up Dane’s books as well.

Dane scored a great deal with her publisher. Over the next three months, three of her novels will be released. No One Left To Tell comes out next, followed by No One Lives Forever. Although they sound like a series, all of them feature different heroines and heroes.

Pick up Jordan Dane’s novels even if you don’t have time to read them now. They’re perfect beach books, though you may be more tense lying in the sun and lawn chair than you’d planned on being!

Victorian London will be forever etched into the minds of readers that enjoy twisty mysteries and macabre adventures set against a history sharply defined in books and movies. Sir Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes stories first come to mind, as well as later forays such as The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen by Alan Moore. Stephen Spielberg even took a run at the genre and the setting in Young Sherlock Holmes.

I have to admit, I’m a bonafide sucker for the milieu. I grew up hanging onto Sherlock’s coattails while the game was afoot, and I never quite recovered from that first blush of fog-crowded streets and Hansom cabs clattering across cobblestones. Oklahoma author Will Thomas has set up a fine Sherlock riff in his own series about Baker and Llewelyn, Victorian detectives.

But Jonathan Barnes’s new novel, The Somnambulist, takes pre-conceived notions of Victorian mystery novels and adventures and turns them on their ears. And this is only his first novel!

I was captured at once by Barnes’s writing. He favors a blend of modern, easy to read, language mixed with a shading of the long-winded Victorian trappings and a touch of purple prose. It’s a fine brew and I found myself sailing along within just a few pages. His writing is so smooth, and his imagery so evocative, that the world of Edward Moon and the Somnambulist grew larger and deeper and more textured with every word.

I have to admit, Edward Moon isn’t one of the most likeable people you’re going to find in this novel, but he is our chief detective. Like Holmes, Moon is a quirky individual filled with his own ego and intelligence. He’s a stage magician by trade, but his intellect is keen and he’s knowledgeable about a great many things. Moon is also rather novel in his relaxation pursuits, and I found myself jarred quite deeply when he elected to sample the wares of a local house of prostitution. I decided at that point not to like him overly much, but the traits – all too human and poignant for some weird reason – made him even more fascinating.

But where Moon has a few things hidden from the reader that are eventually revealed, his companion – the Somnambulist – remains an enigma. He’s a large, strong man who can’t speak but does communicate through a portable chalkboard he carries with him. He also has the peculiar ability of being able to become a veritable pincushion for swords that Moon thrusts through him in their magic act, and for enemies that battle him. He’s got an unexplained fetish for milk.

Together, these two form our crime-fighting duo for the novel. In the beginning, Moon is vaguely interested in the murder of Cyril Honeyman. At first, Honeyman’s death is believed to be a suicide. But Moon believes it’s murder.

I really liked the mystery set up and the way that Moon and the Somnambulist were first brought into the mystery, then attempts were made to scare them off, then they were forced back into it. All the while the police were buzzing around trying to figure out what Moon knew. I enjoyed the familiar romp a lot.

Then about halfway through the novel, The Somnambulist takes a hard right turn into the Twlight Zone – without the warning signpost up ahead. I felt like Wile E. Coyote when he goes out over that empty canyon after the Road Runner. I’d been poking along with the novel at that point, simply enjoying the well-written read. Then the thing turned out to not quite be as simple as I’d believed.

I can’t tell you any more. You’ll have to read it to see where and to what lengths Barnes’s fertile mind takes you. However, I recommend the read whole-heartedly. Besides the quirky characters, some tantalizing mystery reveals, and a huge backstory, Barnes offers a wonderful view of Victorian London. The city comes to life on every page.

Barnes crafted a compelling read and characters with this first novel. I can’t wait to see where he takes his readers next. I’m going to be one of them.

In addition to being a bestselling novelist and a noted award-winning short story writer, Joe Hill also happens to be the son of novelist Stephen King. I lead with that and I feel guilty about it at the same time. Hill created his own name in order to create his own identity, and as soon as we found out, we start telling each other. As I said, I feel guilty, but I also know that letting the cat out of the bag, again, will draw more people to this review and hopefully pump up Hill’s sales. He deserves to be read. He has an intriguing mind and a unique way of looking at the dark corners in life.

Despite his paternity, Hill has crafted an existence for himself that’s just starting to take off. His novel, Heart-Shaped Box, leapt onto bestseller lists and latched hold of horror fans’ psyches in wild, delicious ways. His collection of short stories, 20th Century Ghosts, has won the Bram Stoker Award, the British Fantasy Award, and the International Horror Guild Award.

Now, along with artist Gabriel Rodriguez, Hill has staked out the comics medium with a new series called Locke & Key. The launch is a page-turning suspense story full of surprises. According to information that’s been released by IDW Publishing, this is going to be at least a six-issue monthly series. Hill has plans for at 68 issues of Keyhouse.

I really like the idea behind the house and the series. It focuses on kids, and the house has doors they can pass through that will change them. The power of the doors can change their age, their race, and their sex, and has a tendency to push people toward the evil we all carry around inside us.

The first issue is stunning. When I saw the blood-red cover with the old key so prominent, I didn’t at first see the house in the background. Then when I saw the house I couldn’t get it out of my mind. I just sat there for a moment, frozen, thinking about all the possibilities of that key and that house and all those doors. I think that’s what still consumes me about the story.

The story begins quietly, almost innocently, but it quickly turns mean and hard-edged, which is one of the qualities of Hill’s writing. The story picks up with Sam Lesser and Al Grubb, two high school students that were counseled by Tyler Locke’s father, turning up at the Locke house. A single page of simple conversation with Mrs. Locke turns chilling when we see the weapons they’re packing.

On the next page, we get a full-page shot of a man and a woman lying dead in the back of a pickup truck. A bloody tarp barely covers them.

Hill plays with time in this first comic. He leaves us hanging, wanting desperately to turn the pages, but afraid of what we’re going to see at the same time. In four quick panels, we’re introduced to Tyler, Kinsey, and Bode Locke, who are evidently going to be our main characters throughout the comics.

Tyler is the brooding high school teen who resents his dad’s manipulation to get them out to help him paint the summerhouse. Kinsey is a pre-teen girl who seems to be the responsible one. Bode is the ever-curious and ever-daring kid who’s always getting into trouble and exploring. Rodriguez’s art is fantastic and really brings the characters and the environment around them to life while looking simple at the same time.

The panel of Mr. Locke coming home and surprising the teen killers is chilling. Then Hill cuts away to the funeral and we don’t know who’s dead. Afterwards, Tyler sits through unbearable visits from friends who are so disconnected from reality I wanted to scream at them. One guy can only talk about himself. Another can only talk about how famous Tyler is going to be. Writing about real people is one of Hill’s gifts. Apparently illustrating them is one of Rodriguez’s.

While sitting with his Uncle Duncan, Tyler remembers how his father planned for them to go live at Keyhouse if anything ever happened to him. Hill’s script is an economy of language. Every panel moves the story along and provides information as well as emotion. Rodriguez makes them all beautiful to look at.

Then the story plunges back to the day of the murders, when the teen killers were inside the Locke summer home. The next few pages are full of tension, suspense, and thrill-a-second pacing that had me flipping pages like a madman. The story turns chilling, then cuts off again, leaving me hanging once more. You know that Tyler survives, but you don’t know if anyone else does.

The next sequence introduces Keyhouse, and the layout of the grounds, the fact that it’s on a peninsula cut off from civilization, is at once intriguing. I know that the distance away from a populated area is going to be trouble.

Once the exploration of the house begins, which I was dying to see, Hill moves us back to the past again. The graphic panels Rodriguez presents had me once more hanging on as what happened that day of the killings is finally played out. It’s brutal and vicious, but that’s the only way it could have happened.

The true weirdness descends on the story in the next few pages. Bode is off exploring the weird house all on his own when he has an out-of-body-experience. And we learn that Sam Lesser, one of the teen killers, is still alive in juvenile lockup. Not only that, but he’s talking to a mysterious entity he can see in a sink full of water.

I’m totally jacked about this series. I think it’s going to be great. I can’t believe Hill decided to do it as a comic book instead of a novel, but in an interview I read he said he’d just always envisioned it as a comic book.

I love Rodriguez’s art, so that’s a bonus in addition to a great, macabre story with plenty of mystery and suspense. But the waiting over the next five months is going to test me to my limits. I expect I’m going to be daydreaming – or having nightmares – about Keyhouse and what’s really going on for some time now. If you’re a comics fan or a horror fan or a Joe Hill fan, you gotta check this one out.

The Black Book of Secrets by F. E. Higgins has one of the most intriguing premises I’ve seen in a juvenile novel, or an adult novel, in a long time. A quiet man of questionable means moves into a neighborhood where everyone is being bullied by a man who owns everything worth owning. The quiet man, Joe Zabbidou, opens a pawnshop and starts buying what is basically worthless junk from the poor people who live there. Then, shortly after acquiring a young, homeless thief as his apprentice, Joe begins buying the darkest secrets of anyone who will sell them to him during the midnight hour.

I read about the book in a forthcoming announcement and wanted to think about it before I just purchased it. I was in Minnesota over the holidays and stopped in at a bookstore. The Black Book of Secrets sat on the NEW ARRIVALS shelves. Immediately fascinated, I picked up a copy.

The packaging is as compelling and intriguing as the story’s premise. The covers, front and back, are a flat black with the illustration and the back cover copy on them. My eye didn’t catch the designs worked into the book until I felt them. The most eye-catching part of the whole package, though, was the black gilt that framed the pages all the way around. I’ve never seen a book like that. The treatment made the book feel almost…dangerous. And certain foreboding.

I was mesmerized, really. Whether the trade dress (publishing term for how a book looks) was really that good or I was just a soft touch, I don’t know. But the book’s designer is fantastic. The only real bright spot on the book’s cover is that curious and brightly colored frog.

When I opened the book, I found the inside was just as different as the outside. The book’s generous margins, clear and easy to read font, and the thin, almost fragile feel, of the pages made me want to turn them.

I read the opening chapter, a short but very intense five pages, and was instantly gripped by poor Ludlow Fitch’s predicament. Ludlow lives in the City, but it can’t be any other city than 19th century London, and the mean, downtrodden existence he leads is properly Dickensian. His lowlife parents have taken Ludlow to a foul dentist to sell the teeth right out of his head. They strap him into the dentist’s chair and the dentist, Dr. Gumbroot – another nice, Dickensian touch, grabs a pair of pliers and latches onto one of Ludlow’s teeth. In that scene alone, I was as hooked as Ludlow.

I picked the book up. Due to the work load I’ve got, I couldn’t get back to it until yesterday. I started it to take a few minutes at lunch. Instead, I ended up captivated and read the entire novel. At 260 pages, it’s fairly short by today’s standards.

But I was swept away through the dirty streets of that neighborhood, got to know all the broken dreams and lost hopes of the people that came to Joe Zabbidou’s pawnshop to sell their darkest secrets, and became even more curious about why Joe was buying them. I also discovered that our hero, Ludlow Fitch, wasn’t the most reliable person Joe could have trusted.

I’m torn over calling this a children’s book or an adult one. I think it plays equally well for both. The novel offers a compelling story with rich characters and a unique time and place that still stands apart from 19th century England in the same way that Joseph Delaney’s The Last Apprentice books do. In some ways it breaks the tenets of juvenile books because it spends so much time with the adult characters. But it never discusses anything inappropriate about their lives or motivations that the 9-12 year olds won’t understand.

The building sense of mystery and dread is fantastic, but I have to admit that when everything was said and done, I was somewhat disappointed. After all the tension that was raised, I really expected more at the end. Still, everything made sense and it satisfied.

This is F. E. Higgins’s first book, but that doesn’t show. Her writing is spare and lean, and not overly descriptive. The narrative pacing is well done – it obviously kept me glued to the book and turning pages till I reached the end, and I’m not always an easy audience. She writes with authority and confidence, and I liked her characters quite a lot because they were so real.

One of the best parts of the book was being a voyeur and listening to the secrets those townspeople came to tell. Each one of them seemed almost like an Edgar Allan Poe short story, filled with twists and turns and surprises.

I don’t know yet if the book is going to be a series, but it could. Each Black Book of Secrets could be about a different place, with different secrets. Given the nature of people’s curiosity about other people’s secrets, I think this is a hook that would make a series work for a while. If Higgins can keep up this kind of quality, I’d definitely read another book or two about Joe and Ludlow.

Higgins does have a second book coming out in March 2008. It’s called The Bone Magician and sports a blood-red cover with a skull. I’ll be picking that one up when it comes out.

These days I find it easier and easier to sink into a fantasy novel written for juvenile readers. I don’t know if it’s the worlds I enjoy, or if it’s the break from “adult” problems and issues. After giving the matter considerable attention, I’ve decided that part of what draws me to fiction for 9-12 year olds is that sense of wonder and fun that is lacking in many of the adult books. They just take themselves too seriously. Or maybe I want to take myself less so.

Whichever is the case, I sat down with Leven Thumps and the Gateway to Foo and found myself whizzing right along in no time because the book offers tons of wonder and fun. Admittedly, I stumbled over the first chapter or two because they are a little dense and weird. But the story straightens itself right out and pounds to the finish line – which is really only the start of a series that currently includes three novels.

When I first saw the character’s name, Leven Thumps, I have to say that I wasn’t interested in reading the book at all. It was just too strange, and the back cover copy didn’t promise me enough to make me purchase the book. But I’m glad I read it.

Where else are you going to find a book chock full of action and adventure, and with candy that will – temporarily – rearrange your body parts? Particularly your eyes, nose, mouth, and ears. When Leven ate some of the candy that Clover, his sycophant – magical protector — gave him, he ended up with his nose between his toes.

The book takes place in Oklahoma, which is where I’m from. However, other than a few superficial details, it doesn’t really feel like Oklahoma. Granted, the book isn’t about Oklahoma, so that shouldn’t matter.

Leven has a hard life (it seems like all the kids heroes these days do) and isn’t loved by anyone (another common problem), but is destined to do great things because he’s an offing. Although it takes a while to get to the part where Leven gets his powers, waiting is worth it. His powers are cool and kids will love them. Heck, even I would like to be able to see into the future and control weather. However, I’d really like to have Winter’s power to turn everything to ice too.

Winter is a young girl whose own life has been horrible. She was raised by her mean mother. In reality, though, Winter is a nit, a citizen of Foo who came to our world to help Leven find the Gateway, find out what his real identity is, and keep safe from Sabine, the villain that has escaped from Foo and means to kill Leven.

One of the funniest bits in the book is what happens to Geth. He was the king of Foo and ended up getting trapped in a tree seed that’s planted on earth. He grows into a huge tree that can move independently, till the day he decides it’s time to find Leven and get to Foo. Then he causes problems, gets chopped into firewood, and eventually ends up as a toothpick throughout the rest of the book. I ended up chuckling out loud at his antics and my wife had to ask me what was so funny. It was too hard to explain. Even after I tried, I knew that the only way to truly get it was to read the book.

I have to admit that I was disappointed about reading 360 pages and not quite getting to journey around in Foo. Of course, there are two other books in the series that seem to offer exactly that.

Leven Thumps and the Gateway to Foo focuses on the journey Leven has to take in order to get to that magical world. The writing is fast-paced and action-packed. The characters are neat and imaginative. And there are parts of the story that are so far over the top I could feel my jaw drop. Like when Winter freezes the ocean so Leven can drive their “borrowed” car across it to escape pursuers. I was really amazed at how quickly I read the book.

With short, punchy sentences and a rapid pace, this book is a great one for reading aloud to kids that might seem daunted by the book’s length. The action and adventure will pull them right in. But they will probably pull you in too, and you may find yourself reading long after you’ve tucked the kids in.

In his latest book, Diary of a Wimpy Kid: Rodrick Rules, Jeff Kinney nearly put me into the hospital. That man is going to have serious medical bills to pay if this keeps up. I almost busted a gut laughing out loud and almost aspirated my Diet Dr Pepper on a few occasions. And, yes, I hold him completely responsible.

If not for Kinney’s dry wit, keen insight into the lives of elementary school boys (especially their rationalization for EVERYTHING), and fantastic line drawing on nearly every page, I wouldn’t have had so many close brushes with death in his latest book. But he put me there time and time again. Even when I thought I had things figured out (because I was once an elementary school boy with a wild imagination without a governor), Jeff would throw a wrinkle at me that I didn’t see coming. He ambushed me with regularity throughout the pages.

But it’s not just me that Jeff has his merciless sights on. He’s taking out EVERYBODY. My wife teaches elementary school and Jeff’s books are all the rage among the students. I have to admit to adding to that bonfire because I talk about his books all the time (and I have to admit that I haven’t quite become the responsible adult either, because I’ll rile my wife’s fourth grade class up and take my leave—taking her out to dinner usually gets me off the hook and my cool points go up with the kids).

Parents have become interested in the books and I’ve told them they need to keep up with what their kids are reading. After all, they’re supposed to be responsible parents. (I, myself, have been known to buy extra copies of Jeff’s books and give out as gifts – some parents have accused me of inciting subversion, but I point out that Jeff’s first book was a New York Times bestseller and that is a far better recommendation than I could ever make. Except the Times doesn’t give away Jeff’s books as gifts that I know of. That’s why they hold me more accountable.)

But when I recommend the books to parents, I issue a stern warning. I call it the PYP warning. I especially give it to pregnant mothers and people with weak bladders who read in public places. PYP is Pee Your Pants. The books are just that funny. You’re reading along, and the next thing you know, WHAM! — you’re laughing so hard you’re peeing your pants.

The funniest thing about Jeff’s humor, and the life of his main character, Greg Heffley, is that everything in the book COULD BE COMPLETELY TRUE. Speaking from experience, a lot of what’s between those pages has been true. But I’m not going to incriminate myself now when I got away with those things all those years ago. And there should be some kind of time statute on most of them. I still don’t want my mom to know, however.

Greg is THE man when it comes to taking a boring day and turning it upside down. People who underestimate the creativity of a bored child are simply asking for trouble. Nuclear war pales by comparison.

And Greg has an excuse – or a rationalization – for everything he does. Worse than that, half the time I get sucked in and totally buy into his point of view. Because, upon occasion, that point of view has been mine as well (or at least my defense). That’s where Jeff’s magic truly lies: he’s never lost touch with his inner child. And boy, his wife must be mad and his kids must be terrified!

In this second book, I was totally blown away yet again. Greg is a middle kid, which means that his life is made miserable from both ends of the spectrum – from his older brother Rodrick and his younger brother Manny. Rodrick is the sulky teen with a band called Loded Diper. And their music stinks, so they’re appropriately named. Manny is three and gets into all of Greg’s stuff.

I love how Jeff sets something up in the books and continues to play off of it at appropriate times. His sense of pacing is fantastic. The work of “art” Manny creates out of toothpicks and aluminum foil is great, and I’ve seen that done, actually. Greg’s mom tells Greg he should keep it around and he does – until it impales Greg’s semi-best friend Rowley.

Another sequence in the book focuses on Greg’s ringleader abilities. Kids will follow anyone with a semi-great idea. Or at least one that will bring pain or embarrassment to another kid. See, Greg is NOT hero material. At least, not yet. He does show some potential, but it’s really far into the future.

One of those ideas involved making believe one of the other kids didn’t exist. Following Greg’s lead, the rest of the class pretends the kid doesn’t exist so much that Greg gets called into the principal’s office, then gets read the riot act by his parents.

I loved when Greg gets involved in the role-playing game Magic and Monsters and his mom becomes concerned. She decides to show up and play with them. And her rules don’t involve all the violence and bloodshed all the kids are used to enjoying. Worst of all, some of Greg’s friends start liking the way his mom plays!

Another instance is when the parents leave for a weekend trip and put Rodrick in charge. They’re no sooner gone than Rodrick is on the phone calling people over for a party. Madness ensues. A door gets painted with permanent marker. Rodrick gets Greg to help him change out doors so the parents don’t find out. Later, when they’re punished, Rodrick says he’s going to study the effects of decompression of the spine suffered by astronauts during prolonged weightlessness. He does this by sacking out on the couch and sleeping all the time while he’s grounded.

If you want, you can even read the books for free on the internet. Just go to Funbrain-dot-com to read them. One of the most interesting things about Jeff’s books is that they’re given away for free and STILL sold enough to make it to the top of the New York Times bestseller list.

You see, Jeff wants everyone to read his books that wants to. However, kids want books they can hold in their hands, share with friends, and put on a shelf. Plus, it’s kind of hard to take your computer and internet along when you’re stuck in the car on a family trip or out with a parent at a doctor’s appointment or a shopping spree.

One of the best features about Jeff’s books after you put them in your kids’ hands is that you don’t have to worry about batteries going dead. They’re kid powered: fueled by imagination and driven by humor. They’re good for the environment. Except for that whole PYP warning.

Jeff’s books are hilarious. I just can’t recommend them enough. Call me subversive if you want.