Snips and Snails and Puppy Dog Tales

Clan by Sigmund Brouwer. Okay, before I even get to the plot, how did this man write ("write"?) over 100 books? Is he one of those with a team of ghostwriters working under his name?

Anyway, on to Clan. Like so many books before it, the story follows the same pattern: Set in prehistoric times, a boy has a bad (leg|foot), so he's an outcast in his clan. But he's more intelligent than anyone else, so he goes on to (save the day|change humanity's future). In Clan's case, it was the latter: The boy's name was Atlatl and he went on to invent... the atlatl (spear thrower). But I swear, I've read five books now with that same setup. Always a boy, always with a bad leg or foot, never something more creative.

While I finished the book (it was a pretty fast read), if it had been longer I would have DNFed it. Characters made 180 changes for no reason and in the blink of an eye (Atlatl's father hated him his entire life, then in a day it changed and he loved him and valued him more than anything).

Atlatl found a saber tooth tiger cub and raised it, but I don't think the author even owned a pet cat before. Atlatl carried the half-grown cub into a river, and while in the story saber tooth tigers hate water, it never even scratched the boy. Try taking a pet cat into a pool! Most of them would claw you while trying to climb you as if you were a tree.

DNF #53: Mega Cataclysm: The Last Survivors Chronicles by Scott Todd. Would you ENJOY reading a book like THIS? With ALL CAP WORDS in every SENTENCE? And a MANLY MAN who has to HIT a WOMAN because, LIKE ALL WOMEN, she panics easily and so she needs a MANLY MAN who KNOWS WHERE HIS CAP LOCK KEY IS to slap her and CALM HER DOWN? Then THIS might be the BOOK for YOU.

DNF #54: Cry Havoc (War in the stars Book 1) by Jolie Mason. If I can't even keep track of who all the characters are through the first chapter, I'm probably going to DNF it.

DNF #55: D-39: A Robodog's Journey by Irene Latham. Set in the future, all dogs in the world had to be killed because of a virus. The main character, a young girl who lived in a place called Worselands (really...) was just completely uninteresting. The story had endless made up words (in every sentence), it just didn't work for me. Things like "poopflush" (toilet), "bombblast" (bomb), "dripface" (cry), "chug-chug" (tractor), "droopbottom face" (sad face), and "leafgiants" (trees).

DNF #56: Hatchet by Gary Paulsen. Preteen boys would probably like this one. The young boy main character flew and landed a plane... his first time being in one, completely alone (pilot died of a heart attack), with no radio contact with anyone.

DNF #57: Ghosts of Tomorrow by Michael R. Fletcher. I dropped this one pretty quickly. Assassin robots armed with katanas. Not to my tastes.