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The Snarkout Boys #2
The Snarkout Boys and the Baconburg Horror
Great questions have always been raised by literature. Moby Dick asks, "Doesn't anyone ever get seasick?" The Odyssey asks, "Doesn't anyone ever get seasick?" The Snarkout Boys and the Baconburg Horror "Why doesn't everyone get food poisoning? How do they survive so many greasy snacks?" "Is Dr. Ormond Sacker really a psychiatrist? Why did the Bongos name their son Winston? (Could he be adopted?)" "Why are werewolves like that?" "Have rat's prayers reached James Dean? Doesn't a great detective have anything better to do?" Here you will find the answers to these questions and many, many others. Provocative to some, stimulating to others, boring to jaded sophisticates, this is a book that must be heard – although it can also be thrown to great effect.
175 pages, Mass Market Paperback
First published January 1, 1984
About the author
Daniel Pinkwater
144 books430 followersDaniel Manus Pinkwater is an author of mostly children's books and is an occasional commentator on National Public Radio. He attended Bard College. Well-known books include Lizard Music, The Snarkout Boys and the Avocado of Death, Fat Men from Space, Borgel, and the picture book The Big Orange Splot. Pinkwater has also illustrated many of his books in the past, although for more recent works that task has passed to his wife Jill Pinkwater.
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Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews
July 14, 2007
Daniel Pinkwater's best. Maybe the best young adult novel ever written. Beat poetry, werewolves, drive-in movies, record-listening parties, professional wrestling, and root beer with a special ingredient. I can't possibly recommend this book enough.
August 3, 2008
Bob Wald is quoted as saying that if you really believe in quantum mechanics then you cannot take it seriously. Daniel Pinkwater demonstrates the same principal for fiction. He really believes in fiction--I'm not saying that he believes fictitious stories to be real; No, he really believes in the power of fiction. But he will not allow anyone to take his writing seriously. In truth I don't know if that is really how Daniel Pinkwater himself views it. But after reading two of his books, that is my conclusion.
The Snarkout Boys and the Baconburg Horror starts out as a taut, gritty, dark thriller but mid way through the book, when you are starting to take it too seriously, just when you are being drawn into this mysterious world, Daniel pulls the rug out from under everything. This is exactly the point where J. K. Rowling and George Lucas go wrong. Just when the whole world is caught up in their story and taking it too seriously they themselves start taking it too seriously! They stop believing in the fiction and they start believing in some kid with broken glasses waving a little wooden stick or some little green guy that never learned to put his nouns before his verbs. Yoda and Harry are great characters, but guess what! They are fiction!
Pinkwater doesn't fall prey to this mistake. Just when things are getting too serious BAMM he hits you with off-the-wall zaniness. After you've finished laughing, there is some disipointment:
You: Hey, I thought this story was serious!
Pinkwater: No, it's fiction! You are reading it for fun!! So open up. I'm about to shove some fun down your throat!
Of course this is the big problem with Daniel Pinkwater. He is his own diabolically evil twin. He is the one that ultimately pulls the rug out from under his stories; and why? Because he believes in stories--not in his stories, just in stories.
The Snarkout Boys and the Baconburg Horror starts out as a taut, gritty, dark thriller but mid way through the book, when you are starting to take it too seriously, just when you are being drawn into this mysterious world, Daniel pulls the rug out from under everything. This is exactly the point where J. K. Rowling and George Lucas go wrong. Just when the whole world is caught up in their story and taking it too seriously they themselves start taking it too seriously! They stop believing in the fiction and they start believing in some kid with broken glasses waving a little wooden stick or some little green guy that never learned to put his nouns before his verbs. Yoda and Harry are great characters, but guess what! They are fiction!
Pinkwater doesn't fall prey to this mistake. Just when things are getting too serious BAMM he hits you with off-the-wall zaniness. After you've finished laughing, there is some disipointment:
You: Hey, I thought this story was serious!
Pinkwater: No, it's fiction! You are reading it for fun!! So open up. I'm about to shove some fun down your throat!
Of course this is the big problem with Daniel Pinkwater. He is his own diabolically evil twin. He is the one that ultimately pulls the rug out from under his stories; and why? Because he believes in stories--not in his stories, just in stories.
August 10, 2013
The Stoplight on the corner of 5th and Snark is wanging, banging Clanging in the wind. Oh James Dean where are you now? Squashed in your porsca just when we need you. And the muscle bound crumb bums threaten to beat me up... Just cause I'm weird.- As read by the poet Johnathan Quicksilver at the Dharma Buttons Coffee House, I have that memorized, I've listened to this audio book a bunch of times. Although I agree this book is not nearly as entertaining as The Avocado Of Death, I am dissapointed to see so many negative reviews. I Just wish Pinkwater had written more than just two Snarkout Boys books. GOOD STUFF. Go to DanielPinkwater.com for free downloads of his audio books!!!! YAY
April 5, 2023
Pinkwater makes me laugh with each and every one of his books. He is funny, very clever, and has his own unique imaginative style. There are only two books about the Snarkout Boys...I could read a dozen!
Just did a re-read! I'm doing a one person Daniel Pinkwater celebration and couldn't resist rereading this!
Just did a re-read! I'm doing a one person Daniel Pinkwater celebration and couldn't resist rereading this!
August 15, 2021
"The sign outside said HOWLING FROG -- BOOKS OF THE WEIRD, and inside there was, in addition to a fat bald-headed guy behind the counter, a man with a flowing snowy-white beard."
~ Before Reading ~
I recently reread Avocado of Death and loved it far more than I'd remembered. I picked up on more absurd details, and understood the plotlines more. Now I'm itching for more adventures with Walter, Winston, Rat, Uncle Flipping, Osgood Sigerson, and of course, the great and terrible Wallace Nussbaum. I hope it's as good as the first one!
~ First Impression ~
Whew, that ENDING! Oh, I wish there was another book in this series... I just need more. More of Baconburg. More mysteries. More adventures. Heck, I could read five more Snarkout books. This one didn't quite reach the height of its predecessor in my mind -- there was less random weirdness and more emphasis on the supernatural thriller aspect, but it was still a wild and absurd ride. Just the way I like it.
~ Stats ~
Title: The Snarkout Boys and the Baconburg Horror (Snarkout Boys series, #2)
A fantastic and appropriate title.
Author: Daniel Pinkwater
Genre: Absurdist-horror-thriller-young-adult-mystery? Pinkwater's books are hard to categorize.
Age Recommendation: 11+ (It's a bit creepy, there are a lot of plot threads and characters to keep track of, the characters are high schoolers so younger readers may not connect with them.)
"Even the Feldmans nibbled a borgelnuskie apiece, although they expressed fear that they might have indigestion later. 'Nonsense,' Dr. Ormond Sacker said. 'I am a medical man, and I can tell you for certain that there is no reason to worry. You will have indigestion later."
~ Characters ~
★★★★ -- 4 stars
Our characters from Avocado of Death are still here. Walter, Winston, and Rat haven't really undergone much change, other than realizing the true weird depths of Baconburg. (Well, Rat probably knew about that already. It was just new for Walter and Winston.) We also meet a variety of new characters: Scott Feldman, an annoying boy who's always hanging around Rat, Jonathan Quicksilver, a poet, the honorable Lama Lumpo Smythe-Finkel, phantomologist K. E. Kelman, and his renowned mom Lydia LaZonga.
As with Avocado of Death, the characters are strange. I love this about them. They all add to the plot in some way or another, and they are all weird and funny and ridiculous. However, most of them don't really have much of a personality, even the main characters. It helps the readers imagine themselves in their shoes. I couldn't really tell you what Walter or Winston were like. Rat, yes, she's got a personality. But Walter and Winston are rather bland.
That's the only bland part of this story, though.
~ Plot ~
★★★★✫ -- 4.5 stars
Walter, Winston, and Rat go to a new Baconburg location: the Dharma Buns Coffee House. They meet an odd poet named Jonathan Quicksilver, and soon after, there's a werewolf scare! These incidents happen more and more often. The townsfolk call it the Baconburg Horror. But what is it exactly? A werewolf? A zombie? Something pretending to be a werewolf? Is Wallace Nussbaum somehow involved in all this? And why is Scott Feldman so annoying?! The answers to these questions bring Walter, Rat, and Winston on a second wild adventure. Through malls and bookstores, Ms. Donuts and drive-in theaters, and of course, the Deadly Nightshade Diner -- We Never Close.
This book has a more streamlined plot than the first one. The crew are trying to figure out what's going on with all the werewolf rumors, instead of not really understanding what's happening as they're yanked from one secret location to another, out of one mystery and into the next, like it was in the first book. I think it was very well done; the suspense really cranks up at the final showdown. With the fire and all, it was so dramatic! I loved it. I also loved how they all got together at the Deadly Nightshade Diner, and more and more people kept showing up -- all the threads of their adventures were connecting in the most delightfully satisfying way to eat borgelnuskies and make a plan.
I never guessed that
"Something was careening crazily around the parking area. At first I thought it was the werewolf. Then I saw that it was the automated Japanese pizza chef robot. It had gone out of control. It was zooming up and down the aisles at high speed shooting hot pizzas out of its slot at car window height. Some of the Romanians got painful cheese burns."
~ Setting ~
★★★★ -- 4 stars
Baconburg gains new, weird, and exciting locations in this sequel, such as the Dharma Buns Coffee House, the Howling Frog bookshop, and the Deadly Nightshade Diner -- We Never Close. I enjoyed this setting-deepening; it was nice to know more about Baconburg. (I really am one for worldbuilding, hahaha.) As always, the names for places are ridiculous. :)
~ Style/Format ~
★★★★★ -- 5 stars
I enjoyed the new usage of chapters to show different points of view. It added some tension as we saw the Baconburg Horror's point of view, then switched back to our heroes trying to figure out what it was.
Additionally, in the fantastically blazing finale, the point-of-view switches really elevated the suspense. I could practically feel the characters' hearts racing, their legs trembling. It was amazing.
~ Theme ~
★★★★ -- 4 stars
Similar to the last book, this book doesn't have a clearly preached theme, which I loved. It does have some motifs of cooperation leading to success, but again, it's not heavy-handed. The book's not written around the theme -- the theme comes out of the story, raw and unintended.
~ General Thoughts ~
A worthy sequel. It doesn't outshine its predecessor, hitting slightly below Avocado of Death's bar, but is a solid and decent follow-up nevertheless.
Overall rating -- 4 stars ★★★★
If you liked this book
Pinkwater's unique brand of weirdness shows through in his book Lizard Music
Another thriller-type book, with less of the strange and funny and more of the actually creepy, is Took: A Ghost Story, by Mary Downing Hahn.
THE STOP LIGHT ON THE CORNER
OF FIFTH AND SNARK
IS WHANGING
BANGING
CLANGING IN THE WIND
OH JAMES DEAN WHERE ARE YOU NOW
SQUASHED
IN
YOUR
PORSCHE
JUST WHEN WE NEED
YOU
AND
THE MUSCLEBOUND CRUM-BUMS
THREATEN TO BEAT ME UP
JUST
CAUSE
I'M
WEIRD
*
~ Before Reading ~
I recently reread Avocado of Death and loved it far more than I'd remembered. I picked up on more absurd details, and understood the plotlines more. Now I'm itching for more adventures with Walter, Winston, Rat, Uncle Flipping, Osgood Sigerson, and of course, the great and terrible Wallace Nussbaum. I hope it's as good as the first one!
~ First Impression ~
Whew, that ENDING! Oh, I wish there was another book in this series... I just need more. More of Baconburg. More mysteries. More adventures. Heck, I could read five more Snarkout books. This one didn't quite reach the height of its predecessor in my mind -- there was less random weirdness and more emphasis on the supernatural thriller aspect, but it was still a wild and absurd ride. Just the way I like it.
~ Stats ~
Title: The Snarkout Boys and the Baconburg Horror (Snarkout Boys series, #2)
A fantastic and appropriate title.
Author: Daniel Pinkwater
Genre: Absurdist-horror-thriller-young-adult-mystery? Pinkwater's books are hard to categorize.
Age Recommendation: 11+ (It's a bit creepy, there are a lot of plot threads and characters to keep track of, the characters are high schoolers so younger readers may not connect with them.)
"Even the Feldmans nibbled a borgelnuskie apiece, although they expressed fear that they might have indigestion later. 'Nonsense,' Dr. Ormond Sacker said. 'I am a medical man, and I can tell you for certain that there is no reason to worry. You will have indigestion later."
~ Characters ~
★★★★ -- 4 stars
Our characters from Avocado of Death are still here. Walter, Winston, and Rat haven't really undergone much change, other than realizing the true weird depths of Baconburg. (Well, Rat probably knew about that already. It was just new for Walter and Winston.) We also meet a variety of new characters: Scott Feldman, an annoying boy who's always hanging around Rat, Jonathan Quicksilver, a poet, the honorable Lama Lumpo Smythe-Finkel, phantomologist K. E. Kelman, and his renowned mom Lydia LaZonga.
As with Avocado of Death, the characters are strange. I love this about them. They all add to the plot in some way or another, and they are all weird and funny and ridiculous. However, most of them don't really have much of a personality, even the main characters. It helps the readers imagine themselves in their shoes. I couldn't really tell you what Walter or Winston were like. Rat, yes, she's got a personality. But Walter and Winston are rather bland.
That's the only bland part of this story, though.
~ Plot ~
★★★★✫ -- 4.5 stars
Walter, Winston, and Rat go to a new Baconburg location: the Dharma Buns Coffee House. They meet an odd poet named Jonathan Quicksilver, and soon after, there's a werewolf scare! These incidents happen more and more often. The townsfolk call it the Baconburg Horror. But what is it exactly? A werewolf? A zombie? Something pretending to be a werewolf? Is Wallace Nussbaum somehow involved in all this? And why is Scott Feldman so annoying?! The answers to these questions bring Walter, Rat, and Winston on a second wild adventure. Through malls and bookstores, Ms. Donuts and drive-in theaters, and of course, the Deadly Nightshade Diner -- We Never Close.
This book has a more streamlined plot than the first one. The crew are trying to figure out what's going on with all the werewolf rumors, instead of not really understanding what's happening as they're yanked from one secret location to another, out of one mystery and into the next, like it was in the first book. I think it was very well done; the suspense really cranks up at the final showdown. With the fire and all, it was so dramatic! I loved it. I also loved how they all got together at the Deadly Nightshade Diner, and more and more people kept showing up -- all the threads of their adventures were connecting in the most delightfully satisfying way to eat borgelnuskies and make a plan.
I never guessed that
"Something was careening crazily around the parking area. At first I thought it was the werewolf. Then I saw that it was the automated Japanese pizza chef robot. It had gone out of control. It was zooming up and down the aisles at high speed shooting hot pizzas out of its slot at car window height. Some of the Romanians got painful cheese burns."
~ Setting ~
★★★★ -- 4 stars
Baconburg gains new, weird, and exciting locations in this sequel, such as the Dharma Buns Coffee House, the Howling Frog bookshop, and the Deadly Nightshade Diner -- We Never Close. I enjoyed this setting-deepening; it was nice to know more about Baconburg. (I really am one for worldbuilding, hahaha.) As always, the names for places are ridiculous. :)
~ Style/Format ~
★★★★★ -- 5 stars
I enjoyed the new usage of chapters to show different points of view. It added some tension as we saw the Baconburg Horror's point of view, then switched back to our heroes trying to figure out what it was.
Additionally, in the fantastically blazing finale, the point-of-view switches really elevated the suspense. I could practically feel the characters' hearts racing, their legs trembling. It was amazing.
~ Theme ~
★★★★ -- 4 stars
Similar to the last book, this book doesn't have a clearly preached theme, which I loved. It does have some motifs of cooperation leading to success, but again, it's not heavy-handed. The book's not written around the theme -- the theme comes out of the story, raw and unintended.
~ General Thoughts ~
A worthy sequel. It doesn't outshine its predecessor, hitting slightly below Avocado of Death's bar, but is a solid and decent follow-up nevertheless.
Overall rating -- 4 stars ★★★★
If you liked this book
Pinkwater's unique brand of weirdness shows through in his book Lizard Music
Another thriller-type book, with less of the strange and funny and more of the actually creepy, is Took: A Ghost Story, by Mary Downing Hahn.
THE STOP LIGHT ON THE CORNER
OF FIFTH AND SNARK
IS WHANGING
BANGING
CLANGING IN THE WIND
OH JAMES DEAN WHERE ARE YOU NOW
SQUASHED
IN
YOUR
PORSCHE
JUST WHEN WE NEED
YOU
AND
THE MUSCLEBOUND CRUM-BUMS
THREATEN TO BEAT ME UP
JUST
CAUSE
I'M
WEIRD
*
June 14, 2012
The second in the Snarkout Boys, and my favorite. Particularly the snippets from the Baconburg Horror's POV. I really wish I had been able to read these books when I was a teenager, rather than an adult. Then I would have been able to love them longer. :) A wonderful follow up to The Avocado of Death.
January 14, 2009
Another kick ass book from my childhood. I have read it multiple times as both a child and an adult ~ it cracks me up every time :) Totally wacky! I love the pictures of Pinkwater on the back, slowly turning into a Warewolf.
July 6, 2015
Hilarious
This is the second novel in the Snark-Out Boys Duology, which means it's a hilarious, laugh-out-loud romp of a monster story. Mr. Pinkwater's sense of comedic timing is flawless and his playing around with chapter structure makes the jokes even better.
This is the second novel in the Snark-Out Boys Duology, which means it's a hilarious, laugh-out-loud romp of a monster story. Mr. Pinkwater's sense of comedic timing is flawless and his playing around with chapter structure makes the jokes even better.
December 16, 2022
Had read this ages ago and remember loving it. A delightfully kooky adventure in a book with an interesting and fun cast of characters. Surprised I enjoyed it as much as an adult as I did as a teenager!
May 22, 2019
The Snarkout Boys Are Baaack
I'm a Numero Uno Pinkwater fan. Not as big a fan as Rat is of James Dean, but still. I get a kick out of the Snarkout Boys, but even I would admit that, for me, they fall in the middle of the Pinkwater canon.
Put aside all of Pinkwater's kids' books, (Bongo Larry, the Werewolf Club, maybe the Hoboken Chicken stories, and so on). Put aside the adult book. Consider the tween/YA books. I put "The Education of Robert Nifkin", "Lizard Music", and the three books in the Neddiad cycle in the absolute top position. For many readers the "Alan Mendelsohn, Boy From Mars" book goes here too. Then, I think, we get to the Snarkout Boys.
The Snarkout adventures are fun and funny, with clever puns, snappy banter, deadpan throwaway lines, quirky characters, and bizarre plot twists and turns. But the books I listed above really, to greater or lesser extent, speak to the reader and often have a deep and memorable effect. Even here, with the loads of funny bits and great one-liners and the characters' rim shot deliveries, the Snarkout tales feel more like pure Pinkwater entertainments. Sort of like warmups before the big game.That's fine, and this is a fun book; I'd encourage anyone to read this, but I'd strongly encourage them to read one the books noted above to find out why so many Pinkwater fans are so devoted to his books, and why so many fans who write reviews write about how affected they were by him in their tween and teen years.
So, hop right in here, but then keep going. Especially if you need a kind and generous person to tell you that it's O.K. to be odd, or quirky, or nerdy, or listening and marching to your own particular drummer.
(Please note that I found this particular edition of this book while browsing kindleunlimited freebies, although I'm pretty sure I have a paperback copy of it around here somewhere. I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)
I'm a Numero Uno Pinkwater fan. Not as big a fan as Rat is of James Dean, but still. I get a kick out of the Snarkout Boys, but even I would admit that, for me, they fall in the middle of the Pinkwater canon.
Put aside all of Pinkwater's kids' books, (Bongo Larry, the Werewolf Club, maybe the Hoboken Chicken stories, and so on). Put aside the adult book. Consider the tween/YA books. I put "The Education of Robert Nifkin", "Lizard Music", and the three books in the Neddiad cycle in the absolute top position. For many readers the "Alan Mendelsohn, Boy From Mars" book goes here too. Then, I think, we get to the Snarkout Boys.
The Snarkout adventures are fun and funny, with clever puns, snappy banter, deadpan throwaway lines, quirky characters, and bizarre plot twists and turns. But the books I listed above really, to greater or lesser extent, speak to the reader and often have a deep and memorable effect. Even here, with the loads of funny bits and great one-liners and the characters' rim shot deliveries, the Snarkout tales feel more like pure Pinkwater entertainments. Sort of like warmups before the big game.That's fine, and this is a fun book; I'd encourage anyone to read this, but I'd strongly encourage them to read one the books noted above to find out why so many Pinkwater fans are so devoted to his books, and why so many fans who write reviews write about how affected they were by him in their tween and teen years.
So, hop right in here, but then keep going. Especially if you need a kind and generous person to tell you that it's O.K. to be odd, or quirky, or nerdy, or listening and marching to your own particular drummer.
(Please note that I found this particular edition of this book while browsing kindleunlimited freebies, although I'm pretty sure I have a paperback copy of it around here somewhere. I have no connection at all to either the author or the publisher of this book.)
September 3, 2024
It's impossible to match the original. But it's pretty good. It's somewhat exhausting to read out loud because Pinkwater always uses the full names of things (The Deadly Night Shade Diner - We Never Close; K.H. Kelman, PH are examples). Jonathan Quicksilver and his terrible beat poetry are great; Finn really loved those.
Pinkwater switches to third-person in this one with some pretty funny bits (like the "If one were a [fill in the blank]" scene at the Deadly Night Shade Diner - We Never Close or the asides about the citizens of Blint burning down the first drive-in movie and then immigrating to Baconburg) that seem like the template for Lemony Snicket to follow 20 years later. The scene in the crappy mall where Walter, Winston, and Rat meet Howling Frog, the Honorable Lama Lumpo Symthe-Finkle, and most epically, Scott Feldman is probably the best part. Scott Feldman is incredible, but for some reason, by the end of the book becomes kinda dumb and infantile instead of just continuing to be a pretentious prig. (That alone might be why I can't give it 5 stars. I still think the ending should have been funnier.)
Pinkwater switches to third-person in this one with some pretty funny bits (like the "If one were a [fill in the blank]" scene at the Deadly Night Shade Diner - We Never Close or the asides about the citizens of Blint burning down the first drive-in movie and then immigrating to Baconburg) that seem like the template for Lemony Snicket to follow 20 years later. The scene in the crappy mall where Walter, Winston, and Rat meet Howling Frog, the Honorable Lama Lumpo Symthe-Finkle, and most epically, Scott Feldman is probably the best part. Scott Feldman is incredible, but for some reason, by the end of the book becomes kinda dumb and infantile instead of just continuing to be a pretentious prig. (That alone might be why I can't give it 5 stars. I still think the ending should have been funnier.)
May 1, 2025
Did not like this as well as the first one, mainly because of the one bad choice that unfortunately was fine at the time in mainstream US publishing:
November 16, 2025
Pinkwater’s writing is so dang funny. I love how much the setting of Baconburg is developed in this sequel, and I think it’s so cool how much it shifts perspective compared to the original! Walter seemed to feel much more alienated at the beginning of Avocado of Death, but here, seeing his world from multiple points of view, it feels like he’s really grown up and become a part of his community. It’s sort of a shame the series ends here, but at the same time, it’s also not difficult to imagine these characters getting into all manner of future hijinx. I think this style of writing just broadens my imagination in general.
July 30, 2024
This is perhaps the twentieth time I've read this book, and it remains complete genius. Daniel Pinkwater's book inspire my own writing, because I love that sense his stories give that there's a whole lot of wild weird wonderful stuff happening all around kids that adults aren't mentioning, and all we need to do is start paying attention to have adventures.
April 18, 2020
Two teenage boys and their unusual allies fight to save Baconburg in this hysterically funny novel.
May 13, 2021
This was an amusing read. There is a werewolf in town and they want to catch it but first they have to find it!
May 16, 2023
The author is absolutely great at reading these audiobooks! I don't love this one as much as the first one, but still very funny!
Want to Read
November 10, 2010This book was mentioned in a GeekDad article on the best halloween books for kids. See Goodreads list here.
October 11, 2012
A disappointment, really. I remember the Avocado of Death being a lot better than this. I was looking for more mystery and adventure, but what I got I could barely tolerate at times. Maybe I was just not in the right mood. The World Owes Me a Living Cause I'm Short.
September 16, 2019
I've listened to this 3 times now and it still cracks me up. Anyone not familiar with Daniel Pinkwater needs to rectify that! He is HILARIOUS. And I love that he narrated both of his Snarkout Boys books.
March 3, 2016
I'm obviously in the minority when it comes to rating this book. I guess I just didn't get the humor, because I didn't find it all that funny. It was too implausible to be realistic fiction, but it wasn't weird enough to be fantasy exactly. Just random.
October 27, 2008
I liked this better than the first one. Anything is better with werewolves. Strangely, these books make me want to eat more avocados.
June 24, 2009
This book was hilarious and awesome. I've never enjoyed a writer's style more. I must track down a copy of the first one, Avocado of Death.
November 15, 2010
Because I read it, it's awesome.
September 5, 2013
Not as good as first book. The ending was a little convoluted. But still a very quirky book.
March 15, 2014
What a strange yet enjoyable book! I would have loved this when I was younger.
July 9, 2010
Very funny. Not much intellectual discussion, but it is good to be goofy sometimes!
April 18, 2017
This was the first Pinkwater book I ever read, and I've never forgotten it. If you thought the first Snarkout Boys book was surreal, this one takes the cake. Drawing more immediately on Murakami than the first one did, while keeping the surrealist-meets-Borscht-Belt sensibility of Pinkwater's oeuvre, the novel combines werewolves, Beat poetry, B-movie culture, suburban sprawl and a pure sense of randomness. It's the kind of book that will amuse kids, but be deeply entertaining to adults who have more experience with tropes and obscure pop culture.
Displaying 1 - 28 of 28 reviews