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pithyretort's review against another edition
5.0
I love coming-of-age stories, so I was interested in this book club choice as soon as I got that vibe from it. I enjoyed my time with Oby despite the novel's off center feel, as if the climax of the story was in the first third or so and the rising action was just getting going toward the end. I would have liked it if Terry were more of a fleshed out character instead of a device in Oby's story, but since it is set up as Oby's story, that's more of a quibble.
kasfire's review against another edition
4.0
3.5/5 Stars
This is the story of Oby- a pyromaniac teenager trying to find where he fits in. His story takes place over the course of a year.
Though I wasn't sure how I'd enjoy a coming of age story from a boy's perspective, I ended up liking it. Oby is the kid that most people either knew or were from their childhood. He found an outlet of fire and explosives that sadly caused a misfortune. But once he got some direction with the help of a teacher, he had a clear goal for where he wanted his life to go.
There was the acclimation to Ben Rogers not using quotation marks to designate when people are speaking. It did make it a little hard to read, but at the same time it made sense since this story is Oby reflecting on that year.
Overall, I thought this was a beautiful story of growing up. Granted, there were some moments I needed to take a step back from. But ultimately I enjoyed this story and how Oby's life grew over a summer.
Disclaimer: I received a review copy through NetGalley
This is the story of Oby- a pyromaniac teenager trying to find where he fits in. His story takes place over the course of a year.
Though I wasn't sure how I'd enjoy a coming of age story from a boy's perspective, I ended up liking it. Oby is the kid that most people either knew or were from their childhood. He found an outlet of fire and explosives that sadly caused a misfortune. But once he got some direction with the help of a teacher, he had a clear goal for where he wanted his life to go.
There was the acclimation to Ben Rogers not using quotation marks to designate when people are speaking. It did make it a little hard to read, but at the same time it made sense since this story is Oby reflecting on that year.
Overall, I thought this was a beautiful story of growing up. Granted, there were some moments I needed to take a step back from. But ultimately I enjoyed this story and how Oby's life grew over a summer.
Disclaimer: I received a review copy through NetGalley
jennyshank's review against another edition
5.0
Practical Pyromania: a coming-of-age story of a Nevada pyromaniac
http://www.hcn.org/issues/44.13/practical-pyromania-a-review-of-the-flamer
The Flamer
Ben Rogers
257 pages, softcover: $14.
Aqueous Books, 2012.
Ben Rogers' engaging first novel, The Flamer, is the coming-of-age story of a young Nevada pyromaniac named Oby Brooks. Oby discovers his love for conflagrations when his father donates the family's dilapidated house to the Reno Fire Department to burn "for training purposes." The boy watches the fire, riveted: "A dragon was eating my house and I couldn't tear my eyes away."
The trajectory of Oby's life becomes even clearer once he steals some pure sodium from Mr. Weisgard, a scientist visiting his class. He smuggles it home, where it ignites his fireworks-packed closet. "That closet of yours," his dad fumes during the chaos, "it's like a munitions locker."
But there's no evil intent behind Oby's obsession -- he just likes to blow stuff up. Weisgard sentences Oby to kitchen duty while he tutors him in chemistry; Oby even wins several Boy Scout merit badges. As the boy's probation ends, Mr. Weisgard encourages him to nurture his interest in science and explosions. "Nevada's full of things that need blowing up," Mr. Weisgard observes, and helps Oby find a summer internship at a quarry. The author's talent for humor and characterization reach their height in the novel's quarry section, where a whole cast of colorful yet believable characters welcome Oby and initiate him into the secrets of their peculiar world.
Oby embodies the spirit of Nevada, given the state's tendency to ignite in spectacular forest fires, weapons tests and mining quarry blasts. And he has a strong, defiant affection for his home: "The prospect of ever moving away from Reno hit me like a body punch. … Maybe I was a high-altitude recipe. I might not rise anywhere else. Too much pressure."
Rogers writes with crisp precision about subjects as varied as science, the complex matters of the heart, and the Great Basin landscape. "The hills around Reno yellowed. The air turned hot and dry. Afternoon thunderstorms sent more lightning to the ground than rain. Brushfires flared up, blackening mountainsides. Atoms that had been sagebrush and pine trees were reincarnated as smoke."
The Flamer is a highly original and delightful debut by a writer who captures the quirks of this region with genuine love but without sentimental pieties.
http://www.hcn.org/issues/44.13/practical-pyromania-a-review-of-the-flamer
The Flamer
Ben Rogers
257 pages, softcover: $14.
Aqueous Books, 2012.
Ben Rogers' engaging first novel, The Flamer, is the coming-of-age story of a young Nevada pyromaniac named Oby Brooks. Oby discovers his love for conflagrations when his father donates the family's dilapidated house to the Reno Fire Department to burn "for training purposes." The boy watches the fire, riveted: "A dragon was eating my house and I couldn't tear my eyes away."
The trajectory of Oby's life becomes even clearer once he steals some pure sodium from Mr. Weisgard, a scientist visiting his class. He smuggles it home, where it ignites his fireworks-packed closet. "That closet of yours," his dad fumes during the chaos, "it's like a munitions locker."
But there's no evil intent behind Oby's obsession -- he just likes to blow stuff up. Weisgard sentences Oby to kitchen duty while he tutors him in chemistry; Oby even wins several Boy Scout merit badges. As the boy's probation ends, Mr. Weisgard encourages him to nurture his interest in science and explosions. "Nevada's full of things that need blowing up," Mr. Weisgard observes, and helps Oby find a summer internship at a quarry. The author's talent for humor and characterization reach their height in the novel's quarry section, where a whole cast of colorful yet believable characters welcome Oby and initiate him into the secrets of their peculiar world.
Oby embodies the spirit of Nevada, given the state's tendency to ignite in spectacular forest fires, weapons tests and mining quarry blasts. And he has a strong, defiant affection for his home: "The prospect of ever moving away from Reno hit me like a body punch. … Maybe I was a high-altitude recipe. I might not rise anywhere else. Too much pressure."
Rogers writes with crisp precision about subjects as varied as science, the complex matters of the heart, and the Great Basin landscape. "The hills around Reno yellowed. The air turned hot and dry. Afternoon thunderstorms sent more lightning to the ground than rain. Brushfires flared up, blackening mountainsides. Atoms that had been sagebrush and pine trees were reincarnated as smoke."
The Flamer is a highly original and delightful debut by a writer who captures the quirks of this region with genuine love but without sentimental pieties.
melanie_page's review against another edition
5.0
The Flamer: mostly about explosions and science and less about sexuality, although the title might lead you to think that. The Flamer: really, it’s thirteen-year-old “Oby” Brooks lost in his newly teenaged body being directed by adults who shape his fascinations.
Oby represents everyone who was a regular pubescent teenager: completely lost emotionally, growing hair in new places, and trying to separate himself from his parents. He describes his soul as “a hermit crab inhabiting a loner bowling shoe.” Oby’s thought process fits so well with teenage mentality that I wonder how Ben Rogers did it. When watching a movie, Oby’s mother fast-forwards through sex scenes, but Oby wonders, “...how could we respect the characters anymore, having witnessed their naked spasm sandwich?”
Getting into Oby’s psyche was a bit of an adventure for me, as I haven’t read many books where boys seem accurately represented in a way that fits what I remember of them from my time as a girl and what I know of youths today. While playing “crapple” baseball, Oby’s neighbor wrestles him to the ground, and Oby is kissed. This is the “flamer” part of the novel, but it’s really small. Oby is then plagued by questions that common with young teens, except Oby’s first kiss has been ‘tainted’--“I was 100 percent, USDA Choice homo until I made out with a girl, at which point I’d be 50/50 and the review panel would have to take into account new variables: duration of encounter, willingness of participants, tongue, et cetera.” Rogers takes those teenage questions we all panic over and adds humor to Oby, and I really grew to love this boy. He’s beyond stereotype or easy labeling, and I never knew where he was going; I eagerly followed his unconventional aspirations, which take us to the quarry.
Oby’s internship boss is ‘Teri’ (short for vegetarian), a woman who “...didn’t seem to take orders from anyone in particular, from anyone at all, really....People came to her with problems. She put out fires. She wore Old Spice.” What I love most about the novel are the surprises in character development. I want to assume Teri is a “butch lesbian,” but really, she’s a woman with a history who carries her own and makes it among the beefiest of men. She is young; she was someone’s girlfriend once. You’ll grow to love the shit out of her and the role Oby plays in shaping Teri’s past into a potentially beautiful future. Watching Rogers’s characters change is like watching a sculptor take a lump of clay and shape it into something organic to the human spirit.
Oby represents everyone who was a regular pubescent teenager: completely lost emotionally, growing hair in new places, and trying to separate himself from his parents. He describes his soul as “a hermit crab inhabiting a loner bowling shoe.” Oby’s thought process fits so well with teenage mentality that I wonder how Ben Rogers did it. When watching a movie, Oby’s mother fast-forwards through sex scenes, but Oby wonders, “...how could we respect the characters anymore, having witnessed their naked spasm sandwich?”
Getting into Oby’s psyche was a bit of an adventure for me, as I haven’t read many books where boys seem accurately represented in a way that fits what I remember of them from my time as a girl and what I know of youths today. While playing “crapple” baseball, Oby’s neighbor wrestles him to the ground, and Oby is kissed. This is the “flamer” part of the novel, but it’s really small. Oby is then plagued by questions that common with young teens, except Oby’s first kiss has been ‘tainted’--“I was 100 percent, USDA Choice homo until I made out with a girl, at which point I’d be 50/50 and the review panel would have to take into account new variables: duration of encounter, willingness of participants, tongue, et cetera.” Rogers takes those teenage questions we all panic over and adds humor to Oby, and I really grew to love this boy. He’s beyond stereotype or easy labeling, and I never knew where he was going; I eagerly followed his unconventional aspirations, which take us to the quarry.
Oby’s internship boss is ‘Teri’ (short for vegetarian), a woman who “...didn’t seem to take orders from anyone in particular, from anyone at all, really....People came to her with problems. She put out fires. She wore Old Spice.” What I love most about the novel are the surprises in character development. I want to assume Teri is a “butch lesbian,” but really, she’s a woman with a history who carries her own and makes it among the beefiest of men. She is young; she was someone’s girlfriend once. You’ll grow to love the shit out of her and the role Oby plays in shaping Teri’s past into a potentially beautiful future. Watching Rogers’s characters change is like watching a sculptor take a lump of clay and shape it into something organic to the human spirit.
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