If Edward Gorey ever sat down to write a YA book, it might've been something like this: a deeply weird, Victorian oddity about an family in which each member is given a "birth object" to keep with them always, to guard jealously from harm and the impertinent gaze of others. It might be a bath plug, or a doily, or a box of matches. Weird enough yet? Did I mention the protagonist is a young gentleman of the family who has the talent (curse) of hearing the birth objects, and occasionally other inanimate objects, SPEAK? YA these days feels like a never-ending repetition of dystopian-set love triangles, and in its way, this is one also. But in the face of slick movie productions and pressures of the market, young Clod (that's his name!) and his travails will be a happy reminder that some writers have kept and even cultivated their idiosyncrasies.