Going Bovine by Libba Bray

Bray, L.  (2009).  Going Bovine.  New York:  Delacorte Press.  480 pages, $9.99

Sixteen-year-old Cameron Smith is trying to get through high school (and life) with the least amount of effort.  Will being diagnosed with Creutzfeldt-Jakob's disease help him realize that there is more to life than just getting by?

Cameron Smith is not interested in being at the top of his class, being popular, or making his parents proud.  He just wants to geth through high school and life with the least amount of effort.  But then he starts to lose control of his muscle movements and has hallucinations, particularly a winged angel.  When he punches a fellow classmate, his parents take him to their doctor.  After a battery of tests and talking to specialists, psychiatrists, and psychologists, Cameron is diagnosed with Creutzfeldt-Jakob's disease (mad cow), for which there is no cure.  Dulcie, the winged angel he keeps seeing, convinces him that there is a cure, but he just has to go out and find it.  Determined to find a cure, Cameron, with help from Gonzo, a video-gaming dwarf and Balder, a yard gnome, sets out on a road trip to find a cure for his disease.  Dulcie's appears to him sporadically, but her only help is to follow the "signs".  On their road trip, Cameron experiences life and realizes that he actually does care about himself, his family, and his new friends (Gonzo and Balder).  He also realizes that there is more to life than just getting by and that life is worth living.  Is it too late to Cameron to enjoy and appreciate his life?

At first, I had a hard time keeping up with this book and following the plot, but I stuck with it, and I'm glad I did because I really liked the book.  It helped that I did a little bit of research about Creutzfeldt-Jakob's disease.  It was interesting to see Cameron change his attitude about how he approaches life.  At first, he didn't really care about anything (grades, friends, or family), but as his trip continued, he realized what was really important.  He even found friendship in the unlikeliest of people, and he actually let himself experience life and love and saw how important his family really is to him.  It was just too bad that he realized it a little too late.

When I first heard about this book, I thought, "Doesn't bovine refer to cows?", and then when I read it and realized that Cameron is diagnosed with Creutzfelt-Jakob's disease (AKA mad cow disease), I realized how the title fit in with the story.  I think that in a way, it was Cameron's way of dealing with his disease.  As I was reading and got to know Cameron, I feel that he would have said something like, "Hey, I'm going bovine!" when talking to people about his disease, as though it was his way of making it sound cool, even though he didn't really care much for fitting in, he still wanted to save face and not draw too much attention to himself.

Going Bovine won the Michael L. Printz Award for Excellence in Young Adult Literature.  It was also a Publisher's Weekly Best Book of the Year book and an amazon.com Best Book of the Year book. 

Libba Bray, the author of Going Bovine

You can find more information about the book at http://www.goingbovine.com/ and about the author at http://www.libbabray.com/.  Other books by the author include A Great and Terrible Beauty and The Sweet Far Thing.