Crazy in Poughkeepsie

The inimitable Daniel Pinkwater (The Hoboken Chicken Emergency) brings his zany wit and wisdom to a gentle middle-grade adventure following a kid s off-the-beaten-path journey, featuring an unfocused spiritual guide, a not-quite-dwarf, a graffiti artist, a ghost whale, and mystical shenanigans galore. Crazy in Poughkeepsie is a ludicrous romp reminiscent of the Muppets! This is a book that will make you laugh, grin, and maybe look for more whimsy in your own world. Beth Cato, author of The Clockwork Dagger [Pinkwater has] a magic that s not like anyone else s. Neil Gaiman, author of American GodsMick is a good kid, but maybe he can use just a little guidance. But it s unclear who will be guiding whom, because Mick s brother came home from Tibet with the self-proclaimed Guru Lumpo Smythe-Finkel and his dog Lhasa and then promptly settled both of them in Mick s bedroom.The thing about this kind of guru is that he doesn t seem to know exactly what he s trying to do. He sure does seem to be hungry, though.So Mick agrees to something like a quest, roaming the suburbs with the oddest group of misfits: Lumpo and Lhasa; graffiti-fanatic Verne; and Verne s unusual friend Molly. Molly is a Dwergish girl don t worry if you don t know what that is yet and she seems to be going off the rails a bit. Along the way, the gang will get invited to a rollicking ghost party, consult a very strange little king, and actually discover the truth about Heaven. Or a version of the truth anyway, because in a Daniel Pinkwater tale, the truth is never the slightest bit like what you re expecting.