Book Review: Swim the Fly by Don Calame 

Swim the Fly is a lot of fun and a refresh­ing change of pace in the YA mar­ket. While this is most def­i­nitely a ‘boy’s book’, its one that girls and adults can also appre­ci­ate and enjoy. Matt, Coop and Sean’s sum­mer goal is to finally see a girl naked, but Matt is also deter­mined to impress a girl called Kelly. Nat­u­rally, the only way to do this is by vol­un­teer­ing to swim the 100-yard but­ter­fly. Need­less to say, noth­ing goes accord­ing to plan and ridicu­lous hilar­ity ensues.

If you’re not a fan of toi­let humor, this prob­a­bly isn’t the book for you. For the most part, I was torn between hor­ror and hys­ter­ics. By all accounts, Calame appears to have pretty much nailed the inner work­ings of the ado­les­cent boy — per­haps a lit­tle too well (there’s only so much time in a teenage boy’s head I can take). Yes, some parts were a lit­tle over the top, but Swim the Fly, while as gross and cringe-worthy at times as you might imag­ine, has some sur­pris­ingly heart-warming moments as well.

Many thanks to Tem­plar for pro­vid­ing a copy for review.