A book about trying to be a real book but not really--with doodles!

Cathy’s Book by Sean Stewart
Now I’m not usually one for flair, but when I pulled Cathy’s Book off the shelf and realized that the book came with actual props, I scooped that puppy up and scampered away to discover what was inside like a little schoolgirl. Turns out the props were newspaper clippings, photographs, business cards, all pretty high quality and made of realistic paper that added just the right amount of flair to a somewhat otherwise flat story. Cathy’s Book tries to break the illusion of the “fourth wall” by making it as much like a journal written by a 17-year-old as possible. There are actual phone numbers and websites to check out. I didn’t call any, but they’re not 555 numbers, I’m assuming they work. It was a quick read, and the art was very fun to look at (reviewers were distracted by all the doodles strewn around the pages, but after you get used to it, it’s not that bad). The only thing that confused me (I’m lying: there were several things that confused me that I ignored) was there were CoverGirl brand references throughout, like in movies where the actors set their can of Coke right in front of them so that everyone who is watching the movie thinks (or so Coke hopes) mmm, that Coke looks delicious, or, that actor is hot, I want to be hot, so in order to be hot I must drink Coke like him. You get the idea, it was weird, but after I had a strange hankering to wear lipstick…Anyhoo, it was fun to discover a book that was trying very hard to be different, and the story wasn’t half bad, although I wish there was a little more back story.

Show me the Flair!