The voice in
Libba Bray’s novel,
(DRUMROLL), Going Bovine is primarily (
actually, its completely) dominated by a teenager, Cameron Smith (
also could Bray have chosen a MORE generic last name?). Smith has mad cow disease, but he also has the disease that makes teenagers, teenagers, he has an obvious attitude, and thinks of everything in his own way. The following excerpt is from a chapter during which Cameron is in the hospital and an angel that has been tailing, appears to him in her full form, for the first time.
“‘Hi, Cameron.’
The glow dies down, and she’s standing at the end of my bed – the one who’s been following me around leaving feather messages. I take in the torn fishnets, plaid mini-kilt, shiny riveted breastplate with leather straps at the sides and a worn Great Tremolo decal near the left shoulder. Her wings are a crazy black-and-white-checkered pattern, like they’ve been spray painted at a body shop to look like hipster sneakers.
Blink and the hallucination will go away, Cameron. Shut my eyes tight and open them and she’s still there, all bright and shiny and smiling.” (113)
Cameron speaks right to the reader, making it seem as if you are in his weird, scary, teenage-boy-with-terminal-disease mind. Libba Bray uses diction that is both slang, and humorous to entertain the reader, but still keep the book easy to read and comprehend. The tone is very conversational; it describes the clothes of a girl as one would see them, but more especially as someone reading this book would see them, since more than most of the people that read this book will be teenagers when they read it. Bray finds it easy to connect with her audience like this, but also by uses sarcasm, which is a favorite trick of most teens. Cameron’s inner dialogue is also pictured in the text, so the reader is almost looking at the world out of the protagonist’s eyes, without actually having the terminal disease that Cameron has. Mentioning bands and “hipsters” makes the novel seem as if it were written by an EXTREMELY well read, AND talented friend of mine.
The voice is soo unique mostly because when writing from a teenage perspective most authors either over do-it,
(too much slang, strange phrases, etc.), or they fear that teenagers will be offended by the way they talk in a novel, so the author makes the teens sound perfectly educated.
Libba however
(oh yeah, me and her are on a first name basis now), tells it like it is, Cameron sounds ridiculous, like all of us do when we talk, but he makes sense, he
isn't a delinquent, and he talks in connected
sentences, so even if I had not read the plot, by reading a passage from this book I would know that Cameron is a teenage boy, with some social problems, and a hilarious attitude.
