Dead Boy by Laurel Gale

Reviewed by Andy P.
Grade 10

It was a normal day, same as any, until he died. After that, nothing was the same. His flesh started rotting, and he got infested with maggots. He stunk so bad that the neighbors moved out. He wasn't allowed to go outside and had no friends.

This is what happened to 11-year-old Crow Darlingson. He was just playing around in his room when he suddenly died. His parents wished him back to life, but the wish didn't go as planned. Instead, he ended up /un/dead. After he died, his mom homeschooled him, and as he didn't have any friends and didn't have to eat, he could just study all day and aced all the tests. However he stunk, and when it was too hot, he stunk even more. That's why his neighbors moved out when the AC broke. However, when his new neighbors moved in, he finally had a chance to make a friend. This friend was Melody Plympton, a girl about the same age as Crow. Melody fully believed in magic,
and not just plain old card tricks. She believed that fairies were real and had abducted her mother. When they learn that there is a wish-granting creature underneath the local park that brought Crow back to life, Crow has a
chance to come back to life for real. However, there is a series of tests that you have to pass to get a wish, and you only ever get one wish. When the monster, called the Meera, abducts Melody's "friends" from school, they are forced to go and confront the Meera. They saved one of their friends, but as they didn't know that the other friends got kidnapped too, they went to get their wishes. They find out that their friend got cursed by the Meera. Now Crow is faced with a tough decision. Does he save Luke, the friend, from the Meera's curse, or does he save himself?

The author does a great job describing the characters of the story. She shows Melody's interest in magic, Crow's deadness, and Luke and Travis's cruelness. For example, on page 92, she shows Luke and Travis throwing firecrackers at a little rabbit. She also does an excellent job on describing the tests the characters have to go through. However, the main conflict isn't very clear until the end.

All in all, I would recommend Dead Boy to anyone in general. This book is about friendship and loyalty, two subjects anyone can understand. I liked this book because of the message it tries to show and also because the characters are very likable. Even though there wasn't much action, there was a great deal of puzzle solving. What would you do if you were in Crow's position?