Bone #1 Out From Boneville by Jeff Smith

• Reading level: Ages 11 and up
• Paperback: 144 pages
• Publisher: Scholastic (February 1, 2005)
• Language: English
• Buy The Book: Amazon

 The cornerstone of GRAPHIX, our new graphic novel imprint, BONE is the incredible comic book saga of the unwitting hero who must save an idyllic valley from the forces of evil.

The BONE adventures tell the story of a young bone boy, Fone Bone, and his two cousins, Phoney Bone and Smiley Bone, who are banned from their homeland of Boneville. When the cousins find themselves mysteriously trapped in a wonderful but often terrifying land filled with secrets and danger - and special new friendships - they are soon caught up in adventures beyond their wildest dreams.

     This book is so AWESOME! My friends got me into these books in elementary school, but I didn't finish them until 6th grade, and since then I've read them all three more times! The series has 9 books and a prequel, or maybe 9 including the prequel... oh well. Sometimes it can be a little violent... okay maybe a lot violent, but it's also hilarious and cool. The main characters, Smiley, Fone Bone, and Phoney are the funniest, most adorable little creatures ever, and their friends are awesome too, like Ted the Bug and Gran'ma Ben and Thorn. I especially like how the author makes the book ominous and scary, but then sometimes everything is fine and they're laughing, doing funny stuff, and you're reading and laughing even harder than the characters.

     The things I didn't really like are that some characters smoke (eew). Then sometimes Thorn goes to take a bath in the stream (you can't see her in the pictures, that would be gross) and Fone Bone sees. Then there's the violence, sometimes it's just random fighting, but sometimes it's kinda gruesome, like one guy gets his head cut off and there's blood all over... yeah, gross. Other than that there's no language or anything else.

     My favorite characters are SMILEY! He's awesome and kinda stupid but that's what makes him awesome and funny! He finds a baby rat creature and names him Bartleby, and then after Fone Bone tells him not to bring it with them to the city, guess what he does... brings it with them. My next favorite is definitely Bartleby, he is soooo cute and he looks like a little purple teddy bear! He is brave and smart and he does tricks! Then there are the two stupid rat creatures, they're so funny and stupid, and they're always fighting. One wants to make Fone Bone into a stew, and the other wants a light fluffy quiche. That makes the other creature angry, what kind of monsters are they if they eat quiche?!? I have way too many favorites so I'll just wrap it up now, I love Gran'ma Ben and how she's always flirting with Lucius, and there's Thorn and how she still doesn't know that Fone Bone likes her, even though it's dead obvious! And Fone Bone, he's so cute!

     My least favorite is Briar, she scares me... she's this zombie type lady who was cut in half and then the Locust, her master made her able to float around somehow so that she could free him and he could enslave the world! But I won't tell you anymore, you just have to figure it out yourself and read the book!

                         + 1,000,000,000 x 100!