All you need to do to get this kid moving is ask the question “Want to go to the dinosaur place?”… and he is bolting out the door with his shoes in his hand.

He drags me around the exhibits by my finger, growling at the huge skeletons. He’s not even afraid of the ones who could swallow him whole.

I’m not a big book reviewer. It’s not that I don’t read books — I read quite a good bit — it’s just that few books move me to the point of writing anything about them. I think the last one I mentioned was The Forest of Hands and Teeth (a zombie romance), and that was a few months back.

Well, I’ve got one for ya. The title is Milrose Munce and the Den of Professional Help.

Milrose is a kid who sees the ghosts of the dead students from his school. The dead jocks (most of them idiot football players who died doing something stupid on the field) occupy the basement. The second floor is where all of the emo poets live (one died while trying to fake-commit-suicide in order to get people to take his poetry seriously). And the third floor is where all of the science geeks died during tragic experiments gone terribly awry (one kid died after finding that liquid nitrogen did not make a refreshing beverage). Milrose worries the school staff, who see him talking to only himself, laughing at people who aren’t there, and arguing with pretentious poets who also aren’t there. As his teachers and parents worry over his mental well-being, he is sent to an unseen part of the school known as the “den of professional help”, where a professional is waiting to cure him of his craziness.

This story is clever and funny. I laughed out loud many times while reading it. There was so much snorting and laughing, in fact, that my family would look at me to see why I was making so much noise, disturbing their viewing of Scooby Doo. (It should be noted that I rather like Scooby Doo, so the fact that I ignored it in favor of this book is saying something.) The narrator’s voice reminded me several times over of Lemony Snicket’s voice in the Series of Unfortunate Events books… without the tedious, annoying definitions of words. Milrose is smart, sarcastic, and can dead-pan a joke like nobody’s business.

This book is also clean — profanity speaking. I just started reading it to Jachin at bedtime… Milrose’s dialog is fun to read out loud, though I doubt I really do it justice.

Here’s the stinky thing: this book is tough to find. I got it as a free Kindle download a couple of months back. The Kindle version is still available for cheap (I think about 4 bucks). However, if you try to get it in paperback, you’re out of luck. Because it’s published in the exotic country known as Canada, it’s only available as an import or through third party sellers… for about $80. Crazy. But if you can find it at your library, or if you have a Kindle, I highly recommend it.

Crazy Sock Day… occasionally it’s an official theme for soccer games.

Yes-huh.

And the Wicked Witch of the West is jealous… cuz Zoe brought it tonight.

Did you catch those?

These tights and socks are actually mine… and in the fall and winter, I sport them under jeans all. the. time.

No, seriously. I love them.

(Funny story: I once wound up in the hospital while sporting the cross-bone socks… the nurse giggled at me the whole time I was there.)

But these lucky things led Zoe to score one of the team’s only two goals tonight… so who’s laughing now?

I know… the teen years… I’m so in trouble.