Rob Reger: Emily the Strange v. 1

Loved this book. I loved the twisty mystery and especially the heroine. The magical elements seemed unnecessary but probably would have bothered me less if they'd been there from the beginning instead of showing up fifty pages into an otherwise excellent story about an amnesiac girl with excellent coping skills.

I did wonder suddenly whether the whole book was sort of an I Am the Cheese scenario where our heroine is an increasingly delusional 13 year old runaway. When she went home to Sharon and George and nothing seemed familiar or even worked the way she knew how to make things work, that feeling was strongest. In fact you spend the whole book wondering whether she's crazy or the world is crazy. Or possibly both.

Still, I came away wishing I could be that self-sufficient and self-confident, which is pretty high praise for a funky cool little book.