Title: Punkzilla
Description: For a runaway boy who goes by the name "Punkzilla," kicking a meth habit and a life of petty crime in Portland, Oregon, is a prelude to a mission: reconnecting with his older brother, a gay man dying of cancer in Memphis. Against a backdrop of seedy motels, dicey bus stations, and hitched rides, the desperate fourteen-year-old meets a colorful, sometimes dangerous cast of characters. And in letters to his sibling, he catalogs them all—from an abusive stranger and a ghostly girl to a kind transsexual and an old woman with an oozing eye. The language is raw and revealing, crackling with visceral details and dark humor, yet with each interstate exit Punkzilla's journey grows more urgent; will he make it to Tennessee in time? Told in epistolary style, this daring novel offers a narrative worthy of Kerouac and a keen insight into the power of chance encounters.
Subjects: Fiction, Juvenile Fiction, Puberty, Runaways, Letters, Brothers, Family problems, Grief, Voyages and travels, Bus Travel, Young Adult Fiction, Death, Drug use, Methamphetamine, Juvenile Delinquency, Loners & Outcasts, Runaway teenagers, Runaway teenage boys, Cancer, Drug Abuse, Recovering addicts, YOUNG ADULT FICTION / Social Themes / Drugs, Alcohol, Substance Abuse, Cancer patients, Domestic fiction, Juvenile fiction, Reading Level-Grade 7, Reading Level-Grade 9, Reading Level-Grade 8, Reading Level-Grade 11, Reading Level-Grade 10, Reading Level-Grade 12, Children's fiction, Runaways, fiction, Family life, fiction, Voyages and travels, fiction, Grief, fiction, Letters, fiction, Methamphetamine abuse, Bus travel, Drug abuse, Thieves, Brothers and sisters, fiction
Places: Portland, (Or.), Tennessee, Memphis, (Tenn.), Oregon