Give first-time novelist (and fanboy himself) Barry Lyga a bonus point for not being predictable. The story gives all the signs of heading for an operatically tragic ending, and then doesn't go there. Any alert readers will be sure early on that they know exactly where this book is headed. There's mad telegraphing here -- the bullying, the loving relationship with a bullet, the stepfather (step-facist) who keeps guns, the violent fantasies, the isolation and lack of support. But take the points away again for having an ending that just fizzles out all of a sudden -- apparently he didn't have the courage to follow his own foreshadowing.

Give him another point for enjoyably and wittily explicating comic-geek culture -- he shows real insight into and sardonic compassion for outsider teens. But then take away two for trying to turn the protagonists' really damaging behavior into a heroic stand against blustering adults. They both threaten to blackmail a cranky but harmless school sub-administrator with false charges of pedophilia.

No question that newbie-author Lyga has the writing chops and clearheaded understanding of adolescents to be a fine young adult novelist. He can write an over-the-top, cringe-worthy scene of teen humiliation with the best of them. But he will need to learn a few things about plotting -- such as how to follow his own setup, how to write an ending, and how to empower his heroes without resorting to the kind of manipulation that loses them any right to the reader's sympathy.