Crap Kingdom

A funny and insightful story that successfully combines high school angst and high fantasy heroics. Tom Parking is an endearing and richly portrayed everyboy: he’s awkward around Lindsy, his drama-class crush, and he expects he’ll never get what he secretly wants, which is to become the chosen hero of an endangered world. Tom seems to get his wish when a strange man summons him to a distant kingdom . . . that turns out to be hilariously awful. The magic portal to it is inside a clothing donation bin; most of the population appears unhappy or unstable; and the king is a cruel man who rules from inside a fiberglass castle taken from a miniature-golf course. The absurd details are reminiscent of a Monty Python sketch, but they add up to a full and believable world, which is eventually revealed to be much bigger and more complex than Tom had imagined. DC Pierson doesn’t allow the novel’s unique premise to devolve into mere cleverness. Instead, he takes the plot in surprising and rewarding directions. For example, Tom rejects the kingdom’s overtures for him to be their savior, but later regrets the decision and tries to take it back—only to find that the king has found a new Chosen One, someone Tom knows very well. Though the novel parodies traditional hero tales, in a smart twist it ultimately becomes one. The climax is a grand battle with enormous stakes and a gratifying outcome.