Bash Bash Revolution

Gr 8 Up—Seventeen-year-old high school dropout Matthew Munson lives a low-key life between playing the popular video game Bash Bash Revolution and meet-ups with his religious girlfriend Sally at the local Dairy Queen. But then his father Jeffrey Munson, who has been a very sporadic presence, returns with an AI machine he's been working on with the U.S. government. Although his motives are sometimes questionable, the father insists on bonding with his son over video games. Jeffrey becomes quite good at Bash Bash Revolution, even better than his son, and enters a local gaming tournament. Then, just as father and son seem to be connecting, Jeffrey disappears once again, encouraging Matthew to investigate his father's whereabouts, as well as the AI machine. Bearing similarities to M.T. Anderson's Feed, this timely novel explores the affordances and pitfalls of connecting and changing the world with technology.