Neil Smith

A misfit victim of a school shooter lands in an afterlife exclusively for 13-year-olds, where he finds unexpected happiness and friendship with a boy who appears to be another victim of the same shooter. By the author of Bang Crunch. Original.

Such an amazing book ! A book that talks about bullying and death and redemption and many more subjects in such a good and easy/light way ! With great characters and a great plot too ! One of the first time I did not guess the end of the book ! AMAZING !

Leah Preston

Do you ever wonder, dear Mother and Father, what kind of toothpaste angels use in heaven? I will tell you. . . . This book I am writing to you about my afterlife will be your nitty-gritty. One day I hope to discover a way to deliver my story to you. It is the first week of school in 1979, and Oliver "Boo" Dalrymple--ghostly pale eighth grader; aspiring scientist; social pariah--is standing next to his locker, reciting the periodic table. The next thing he knows, he finds himself lying in a strange bed in a strange land. He is a new resident of a place called Town--an afterlife exclusively for thirteen-year-olds. Soon Boo is joined by Johnny Henzel, a fellow classmate, who brings with him a piece of surprising news about the circumstances of the boys' deaths. In Town, there are no trees or animals, just endless rows of redbrick dormitories surrounded by unscalable walls. No one grows or ages, but everyone arrives just slightly altered from who he or she was before. To Boo's great surprise, the qualities that made him an outcast at home win him friends; and he finds himself capable of a joy he has never experienced. But there is a darker side to life after death--and as Boo and Johnny attempt to learn what happened that fateful day, they discover a disturbing truth that will have profound repercussions for both of them. Hilarious and heartwarming, poignant and profound, Boo is a unique look at the bonds of friendship in what is, ultimately, a book about finding your place in the world--be it this one, or the next.

Jackie Cunningham

Manon Dupont 

From Neil Smith, author of the award-winning, internationally acclaimed story collection Bang Crunch, comes a dark but whimsical debut novel about starting over in the afterlife in the vein of Alice Sebold's The Lovely Bones. When Oliver 'Boo' Dalrymple wakes up in heaven, the eighth-grade science geek thinks he died of a heart defect at his school. But soon after arriving in this hereafter reserved for dead thirteen-year-olds, Boo discovers he’s a 'gommer', a kid who was murdered. What’s more, his killer may also be in heaven. With help from his volatile classmate Johnny, Boo sets out to track down the mysterious Gunboy who cut short both their lives. In a heart-rending story written to his beloved parents, the odd but endearing Boo relates his astonishing heavenly adventures as he tests the limits of friendship, learns about forgiveness and, finally, makes peace with the boy he once was and the boy he can now be.

Boo

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