Kill Me Now

The funny if inconsistent latest from Reed (IRL) follows 14-year-old Miles Lover, nicknamed “Retard,” through the summer before he begins high school in Baltimore. Though he has a summer assignment to write an essay about himself, he is distracted by skateboarding, brawling, and obsessing about body parts and effluvia. Meanwhile, his former, empty house offers refuge from his parents’ bitter divorce and the torture inflicted upon him by his younger twin sisters. If it weren’t for Mister Reese, the old man down the street with whom he smokes weed, he’d have no nurturing at all. Miles’s narrative voice is neurotic and funny, but as summer drags on, he has little to do but get in trouble, which can grow tedious. Luckily, his friendship with Mister Reese and Resee’s home health aide, Nurse Brown, adds necessary warmth and provides him with sources of wisdom. Reed captures all the hilarious grossness of being a teenage boy in this solid coming-of-age story. (Jan.)