Ratings

Content Ratings based on a 0-5 scale where
0 = no objectionable content and
5 = an excessive or disturbing level of content

Guide to Rating System

LANGUAGE

VIOLENCE

SEXUAL CONTENT

ADULT THEMES

Ratings Explanation

Language:  Hell and Damn are used frequently throughout the book, along with a couple appearances of the “s” word, ass, exclamations of deity and sucks.

Violence:  There is a fight and a wolf uses claws to scratch the face of a goblin guard.  “The splotches hang there for a second, then start a syrupy descent.”  The Goblin locks the wolf around the throat.  Roy punches Henry in the gut and smashes his face.  Henry remembers how his mother was smashed to death under a truck of magic.  Roy grabs Eddie by neck.  Gunther hits Henry and knocks him out.  Henry is locked up in “rehabilitative seclusion” and then taken for interrogation.  Doc is found hung with a rope around his neck.  Someone throws rocks and starts a fight.  Henry’s dad admits, “I am a monster, I killed the girl and her grandma.”  The wolves take pixie dust which turns them into something evil and ugly.  They attack each other.  Claws are dug into hair and flesh tearing it away.  Blood and tissue are splattered everywhere.  There are cracks of bones breaking.  Roy punches the leader in the throat.  A story is told of how a young boy died at the hands of his mother.  He was put in a chest and the lid was closed on his neck until it was severed.  Then his body was cut up.  The pixie dust makes the boy come back to life for a brief moment.  Then his body decomposes again and his head comes off still screaming.  A gun is pointed at Henry.  There is a fight and people are hit and bleeding.  Henry is told to kill people.  The goat family gang up on Henry and start beating him.  Henry fights back, hitting with a shovel.  His claws tear into flesh leaving the victim soaked in blood.  Goat horns hit Henry and he flies into a tree.  He is hit in the head with a stone and choked.  There is a jail break and the guard is knocked out.  Henry bites a goblin and his mouth fills with blood.  Henry’s fingernails are pulled off slowly with pliers during an interrogation where he is strapped down, unable to move.  His fingers break as the claw comes free taking with is chunks of hair and flesh.  Fairy skeletons are brought and ground up to make the fairy dust.  Skinner tears himself in half.  There are guts all over the floor.

Sexual Content:  A couple of kisses are shared between Henry and Fiona.  A creature is naked.

Adult Themes:  Henry and Ray are in a juvenile detention center.  Henry sees a therapist to help him work through the loss of his mother and his imprisoned father.  The therapist is found hung to death but it is made to look like suicide.  There is smoking and drinking of various characters throughout.  “His breath is so full of whiskey I’m buzzing on the fumes.” The pixie dust is like a drug and is represented as such in very realistic ways.  There are dealers who try to push the pixie dust onto people.  It is expensive and it makes people do things they normally wouldn’t do.  A fox is trying to sell Henry pixie dust.  He claims the dust is the “real stuff” and will make you feel good.  This is a main theme throughout the book.  Segregation or division of people/creatures due to status is apparent.  Henry and other juveniles repeatedly act out against authority figures.

Synopsis

Who’s afraid of the Big Bad Wolf?  How would you like to be the son of the Big Bad Wolf?  Meet Henry, son of the Big Bad Wolf, who spends his days in a home for “wayward” youth.  Henry wants nothing to do with his father who is in prison for killing a girl and her grandma.  His goal is to stay as far away from him as possible and to become nothing like him.  Then Henry finds letters from his Dad that have been kept from him.  His dad insists that there is more to the story than he has been told and requests his help in uncovering the truth.  With the help of some friends, Henry sets out to learn the truth.  His path leads him to an underground mob with a ruthless crime boss named Skinner.  The city is overrun with pixie dust and dealers, but where is the pixie dust coming from when the pixies have vanished?  Can Henry find the answers and keep himself alive?

I’m afraid of the big, bad wolf!  I haven’t really read a book quite like this before.  It was an interesting idea.  Many known fairy tale characters are brought into this book although not as main characters.  The book was fast paced although a bit violent for my taste.  This is in no way a children’s book.  It is YA level reading and I would keep this book upper high school.  There are so many adult themes and modern day problems in this book, even though they are told in a fantasy setting.  If you are looking for a great kid’s book, try Zorgamazoo, also written by this author.  It is a fantasic read aloud book, all in rhyme that you and your kids will love.