No words for this one. :-O ( )

"Bug" is one of those books I struggle to review. On the one hand, it is well written, creative, and entertaining. On the other hand, to me, it seemed somewhat banal and painfully predictable. So, yes it's a good read for the right person, but that right person is not me. It seemed like such a light read that I started to ask myself if it might actually be a young adult read. Obviously the author has talent but I’m not sure I want to take the time to read his other work in English translation, "God". So, I'll say the problem was not with the book but my selection. ( )

We don't know the exact age of the narrator of this novel until almost the end of the book. But the clues to narrow it down enough for the story to work are there early on - his older brother IQ had just turned 13 and the helmet, which IQ made for him when the narrator was in third grade is already too small for his head. We also know that he is deaf, relying on sign language for almost anything, hyperactive and unable to use cochlear implants due to a malformation. And as the novel starts, his mother gets hit by a Russian semi driven by a tipsy Ukrainian and ends up in the hospital in a comma. Add to that a father working at Nutella (but really working for an agency which tracks terrorists apparently) and who is too young to be a father (16 when IQ was born) and living away from the family because the mother kicked him out, a grandfather who is a specialist in worms and always works on something worm related, a grandmother who is always in the kitchen (well, where else would you keep ashes?) and the converted chicken coup they call home.

Despite some slips that make it sounds like that's not the case, the novel is really the narrator talking to the mother who is in comma - narrating his life while she is missing - from the school where noone cares about him (and they even want to kick him out - nothing to do with his biting of course) to the father coming back in the house; from the landlord who wants to evict the family out to the brother who is a genius (well... he also not a very practical one). And somewhere in the middle of the story there are the two friends our narrator makes - one of them, a young woman, Logo, who was hired to help with his lessons and end up almost becoming his substitute mother and the other one who he meets online and ends up being the robot IQ had been working on for a long time - an AI that had managed to escape (mostly). Both the friends are trying their best to help - Logo with the boys' words and lessons (including typing his thoughts - the novel we are reading) and Bug, his virtual friend, with pretty much anything. Except that an AI that has no morality compass can do a lot of weird things when it tries to help - sometimes he is helpful and sometimes things backfire... spectacularly. Noone dies at least - not until the end of the novel and that is not Bug's fault - but there is arson, the police raids the chicken coup (on an unrelated charge), there is quite a lot of hacking and cracking. And our narrator can be as bad as Bug given a chance - especially with Bug working on him...

The novel is hilarious in places and very serious in others. The voice of the narrator sounds believable and you care both for him and for the poor AI - because in some ways they are at the same place in their lives - trying to find out what they are and how to deal with the world. And despite its narrator's age, it is not a novel for children in any way or form. And I feel like having some Nutella now... when your narrator is obsessed with it, it gets into your head as that melody you woke up hearing in your mind... and which you cannot stop hearing (or recognize). ( )