Going Bovine

Bibliography

Bray, Libba. 2009. Going bovine. Read by Erik Davies. New York: Listening Library. ISBN 9780739385579

Plot Summary

16-year-old Cameron Smith is disaffected and contemptuous of his parents, his popular twin sister, teachers, and life in general. When Cameron starts hallucinating about Fire Gods and a mysterious Dark Wizard, he is diagnosed with Mad Cow (Creutzfeldt-Jakob) disease. Lying in his hospital bed, waiting to go crazy and die, Cameron is visited by a pink-haired angel named Dulcie who sends him on a mission to find Dr. X, find a cure, and save the world. Accompanying him on the mission are his hospital roommate, a hypochondriac gamer dwarf, and a Viking god lawn gnome who is searching for his ship and a way home.

Critical Analysis

Cameron is a rather unsympathetic character in the beginning, this changes as he sets off on his adventure and learns to live and love. At the beginning of Cameron’s adventure it is unclear how much of what he experiences is reality and how much is hallucination. Just as the reader is beginning to care about Cameron, to hope that he succeeds in his mission, it becomes clear that the adventure is only happening in his dying mind. In the end, it no longer matters so much; Cameron has the chance to experience a lifetime’s worth of adventure, to love, to save the world, and to not die a virgin.

Erik Davies brings life to the variety of characters in the audiobook version of Going Bovine. He perfectly captures the sardonic voice of Cameron in the dialogue; however, the narration (from Cameron’s point of view) sometimes misses the mark and sounds like an adult narrator rather than a 16-year-old boy. Each character is given a distinct voice, which works very well for most of the characters, but whenever the character has a thick Texas accent, the exaggerated twang is excruciating. This recording would benefit from having a female voice for the female characters.

Review Excerpts

School Library Journal: “Bray blends in a hearty dose of satire on the road trip as Cameron leaves his Texas deathbed—or does he?—to battle evil forces... It's a trip worth taking, though meandering and message-driven at times. Some teens may check out before Cameron makes it to his final destination, but many will enjoy asking themselves the questions both deep and shallow that pop up along the way.”

Kirkus Reviews: ”This decidedly fantastical premise mixes with armchair physics and time-travel theory as they make their way from Texas to Florida. Or possibly Cameron is just hallucinating his way through his last days in a hospital bed. Whichever view of this at times too-sprawling tale readers take, along the way there is plenty of delightfully funny dialogue ("Okay, Balder? Could you and your Norse goodness do me a solid and take a hike? I need a minute here") and enough real character development, in spite of all the purposefully zany details, to cause genuine concern for their respective fates.”

Connections

* Related books:

Cervantes Saavedra, Miguel de. 2009. Don Quixote. New York: Signet Classics. ISBN 0451531280

Yam, Philip. 2003. The Pathological Protein: Mad Cow, Chronic Wasting, and Other Deadly Prion Diseases. ISBN 0387955089