Ever wonder who really runs this place? 
There Is No Dog
by Meg Rosoff
Doubleday Canada
ISBN: 978 0 385 66829 3
What if the world is really this weird because it was created by a self-involved, disinterested teenager who went about it half-heartedly in the first place? This is the premise of Meg Rosoff’s new teen title, which imagines Bob doing as he pleases while his helpmate/administrator Mr. B tries desperately to manage the messes he’s made and answer a few prayers.
When Bob falls in love with yet another mortal, threatening Earth with natural disasters once again, Mr. B decides he’s had it. His entreaties have no effect, nor do those of Bob’s mother, none too responsible herself. (She did, in fact, secure Bob’s job as god in a poker game, and has now lost his pet the same way.) So will the lovely Lucy fall in love in return? And will Bob’s hapless little pet in fact get eaten? The ending holds a few surprises, none of which I am about to reveal.
The thing of this book is that it is a strange marriage of silly and beautiful. Rosoff can spin gorgeousness out of the words on her page in a way that made me stop and savour it at times, yet Bob is equally base, being a sex-obsessed teenager who leaves his socks on the floor. The juxtaposition leaves you a touch off-kilter and adds to the oddness of the whole, but it somehow all works, and you are left with both beauty and laughter, a dash of tragedy, a wonderful end note of hope, and a little bit of resignation. It’s all a little bit… like life, actually.
Also available as an ebook.
Oh, this sounds like a good one… Oliver isn’t ready for it yet, but I love this sort of juxtaposition in a read. Awesome!