Lizard Music

My dad and i together have read a lot of daniel pinkwater's stories. i found that lizard music next to the snarkout boys collection is my favorite book of his. it's imaginative and dazzling. it expresses the meaning of being a child and takes you into a new world full of odd names and lizard music.

I remember the day that I found this book vividly. The cover was more aesthetic than all the other books in the library, and, peering at the title, I figured I like lizards and I like music. I fell in love with this book shortly thereafter. It's been almost a decade later and I have since read books that have surpassed this in intellectual levels, but its oddness still appeals to me. This is an obscure classic that belongs on the shelves next to Dr. Doolittle and Alice in Wonderland, other favorites from my past. It is difficult to describe this book beyond touting its greatness in vague terms, it is something to be experienced on ones own. To summarize shortly, it is the story of a boy left home alone and his adventure in the big city as he meets the Chicken Man, and sates his curiosity concerning the wacky lizard musicians he comes across. Whether you are young or old, this book will appeal to your creativity and your sense of absurdity.

I won't repeat what others have already said. But I want to add this: unlike many of the reviewers, I first read this book as an adult in my late twenties--and I loved it! To this day, twenty years later, it remains one of my all-time favorites...every couple of years I get it out and re-read it for the pure pleasure of experiencing Pinkwater's wild imagination and believable characters. So don't assume this book is just for kids! Any adult with an imagination--and who remembers being a kid--will get a kick out of "Lizard Music."

Looking back at all the books I read as a kid, I fondly recall several books which did more than tell a wonderful story...they truly made me think differently about the world around me. The L'Engle books, the Dahl books, and the Pinkwater books fall into this category. But most of all, Lizard Music. It's the book that made my kid-self reorganize his brain to accomodate a world with talking lizards and lesser kudus. It's still one of my favorite books of all time.

This is one of those books that you read, and because of its originality, it makes a lasting impression and you never forget it. I, like many other reviewers first read this book in the third or fourth grade. Our little private Catholic school got two D.M. Pinkwater books added to the library, and everybody in my class wanted to read them. I actually wanted the other, Fat Men From Space, but it was taken, so I picked up Lizard Music. It turned out to be one of the best decisions I ever made! This book is amazing, it's funny, fascinating, and very strange. Everything from the Chicken Man to Raymond the Lizard(s), to some island made invisible because of... refraction of light... or something. (It's been a while.) Anyway, my point is, this book has made a great and long-lasting impression on me, and if you like strange and semi-eerie things, or just great fiction... this is a MUST READ!