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3.42 AVERAGE
3.42 AVERAGE
I wavered between 2 and 3 stars. I couldn’t stand the protagonist (Lee), because she was so petty and superficial with no redeeming qualities. But then...she reminded me of my petty, superficial nature in my teenage years and perhaps I didn’t like her because she reminded me of the ugly parts of my younger self. Ugh! All of that work of teenage years, trying to figure out who you are, where you fit in, plus the issues of class. While I never went to boarding school, I was a very middle-class person who attended private school with kids who parents owned planes and had their houses featured in decorating and architectural magazines, so I understand Lee’s confusion about that too. It was slow moving, I wouldn’t necessarily recommend this boom, but it did result in good reflection, so I’m bumping it up to 3 stars.
One of the best books I've ever read. A beautiful and sad and compelling window into being a teenager, that struck me in a very meaningful and nostalgic way, and as impactful as any of the 'great' books about adolescence are but hard to tell because all the covers of this book are so fucking awful. I noticed a lot of one and two star reviews and I think it's because people probably pick up a book that looks like this thinking it's going to be like a novelized Gossip Girl when actually it's just great and serious literary fiction! This book made me laugh out loud and cry and want to write and remember myself.
EDIT: I decided to bump this book up to 4 stars because I found myself thinking about specific scenes from the book the other day out of the blue, and they were still so vivid in my mind, stirring emotion in me despite having finished the book a couple of months ago. That is almost unheard of in my reading life, so for a book to have somehow imprinted itself on my heart and mind that solidly it must be deserving of 5 stars.
Well, this book....where to begin?
There was a lot about this book I really liked, despite really not liking the narrator herself sometimes. And the book was long, and about sort of nothing specific, while also being about a very specific time in life, which meant there was SO MUCH there.
I guess I'll start with the beginning, and the first piece of the story that jumped out at me, which is also an example of why I gave this a 4 star rating. When the book begins, Lee is a freshman at Alt, a boarding school just outside of Boston. After an embarrassment in her English class, she flees, running into a senior girl named Gates. And Lee is enamored by Gates almost immediately. This attention from a senior and subsequent girl crush is short-lived, but felt so true and real. I could so clearly remember a time in junior high when there was a girl in my gym class that I just thought was so cool. Not because she was necessarily one of the popular girls, but because she just had this air about her that was so nonchalant and....well, cool. I wanted so badly to just be her friend, be near her, thinking some of her would rub off on me. Lee's preoccupation with Gates was so reminiscent of that for me, and I loved that Sittenfeld was able to tap into those adolescent feelings so well, in a way that felt so authentic. This was the first instance of that, but those moments are really present all throughout the book: first crushes, fleeting friendships, the feeling of being the outsider, beginning to rebel against your parents -- those things are all here, and I think if most people are being honest, they can relate to all of these things.
That being said, however, Lee was sometimes a very difficult narrator to connect to. It wasn't just her self-deprecating nature -- I think that's present in a lot of people. And I've seen it done in books before, where the narrator is super self-deprecating, but also actually very cool (though of course they don't realize how well-liked they are...blech), and that wasn't Lee either. My problem with Lee wasn't necessarily her insecurities or the areas that she felt flawed or like an outsider -- my issue with her was the way she whined about things, but didn't do anything to change them. The way she would want things, but then when presented with them would sometimes push them away. That drove me crazy, and while so many other things she went through rang true, some of these didn't. An example of this is the night Cross shows up in her dorm room unexpectedly, a little drunk, and climbs into her bed. He goes to kiss her, she knows that's what he's going to do, and she rejects it. Obviously, that rejection doesn't last, but the impulse to NOT want to kiss the person you've been crushing on for YEARS was not something I could necessarily relate to. My ass would have kissed him without a second thought.
Lee's lack of inaction and reluctance to say what she really feels or really means to the people that matter (when it matters) is a very frustrating piece of the book. And a pretty major focus towards the end of the book.. I just had a lot of issues with the way in which she dealt with things, and while Lee is narrating this from some time in the future and can see things a bit more clearly from that perspective, it didn't make me feel any more kindly to her, at least in regards to some of the issues with Cross and Martha.
I think the other thing that really stood out to me in the book was Lee's relationship with her parents. It stood out in a way that made me uncomfortable, but more because, again, I felt what was happening was really relatable. Lee's experience at boarding school distanced herself from her parents earlier than would have been the case otherwise, but her emotions regarding her parents, and the way she felt other people viewed her or her family seemed really relatable. The weekend of the parent visit at the school was so painful to read at times -- the way she was embarrassed by her parents, the fight with her dad -- and yet I can't imagine an adolescent that hasn't gone through a time like that in their life. Granted, Lee had the added layer of being at a boarding school surrounded by rich kids when she herself was not rich, but the rest of it still felt true. There is that phase that you experience where all of a sudden your parents go from being these cool people, to being incredibly embarrassing humans who couldn't possibly know a thing about you. You cringe when they say the wrong thing in front of your friends, and start to think you know so much more than they do. That, of course, is not true -- and eventually you come to realize you were not nearly as cool or right as you thought you were -- but those feelings and that changing view of the people who raised you seems pretty universal.
Anyway...fair or not, the book lost a star because Lee annoyed the crap out of me sometimes. But...I felt like this book really captures a certain time of life (and in a very specific place) remarkably well. I really did enjoy it, and it made me remember being a teenager and think about the way I would have viewed things at that age compared to my current adult perspective.
Well, this book....where to begin?
There was a lot about this book I really liked, despite really not liking the narrator herself sometimes. And the book was long, and about sort of nothing specific, while also being about a very specific time in life, which meant there was SO MUCH there.
I guess I'll start with the beginning, and the first piece of the story that jumped out at me, which is also an example of why I gave this a 4 star rating. When the book begins, Lee is a freshman at Alt, a boarding school just outside of Boston. After an embarrassment in her English class, she flees, running into a senior girl named Gates. And Lee is enamored by Gates almost immediately. This attention from a senior and subsequent girl crush is short-lived, but felt so true and real. I could so clearly remember a time in junior high when there was a girl in my gym class that I just thought was so cool. Not because she was necessarily one of the popular girls, but because she just had this air about her that was so nonchalant and....well, cool. I wanted so badly to just be her friend, be near her, thinking some of her would rub off on me. Lee's preoccupation with Gates was so reminiscent of that for me, and I loved that Sittenfeld was able to tap into those adolescent feelings so well, in a way that felt so authentic. This was the first instance of that, but those moments are really present all throughout the book: first crushes, fleeting friendships, the feeling of being the outsider, beginning to rebel against your parents -- those things are all here, and I think if most people are being honest, they can relate to all of these things.
That being said, however, Lee was sometimes a very difficult narrator to connect to. It wasn't just her self-deprecating nature -- I think that's present in a lot of people. And I've seen it done in books before, where the narrator is super self-deprecating, but also actually very cool (though of course they don't realize how well-liked they are...blech), and that wasn't Lee either. My problem with Lee wasn't necessarily her insecurities or the areas that she felt flawed or like an outsider -- my issue with her was the way she whined about things, but didn't do anything to change them. The way she would want things, but then when presented with them would sometimes push them away. That drove me crazy, and while so many other things she went through rang true, some of these didn't. An example of this is the night Cross shows up in her dorm room unexpectedly, a little drunk, and climbs into her bed. He goes to kiss her, she knows that's what he's going to do, and she rejects it. Obviously, that rejection doesn't last, but the impulse to NOT want to kiss the person you've been crushing on for YEARS was not something I could necessarily relate to. My ass would have kissed him without a second thought.
Lee's lack of inaction and reluctance to say what she really feels or really means to the people that matter (when it matters) is a very frustrating piece of the book. And a pretty major focus towards the end of the book.
Spoiler
In relation to her and Cross, I felt like I should really dislike Cross. I mean, he was supposed to kind of be the stereotypical jock who takes advantage of girls, right? And yet...their confrontation near the end of the book really felt like he was never necessarily trying to take particular advantage of Lee. Would he have been okay with being with her publicly? I don't know. But the fact that Lee hid behind a wall of "he'd never want this anyway, so I'm going to tell him I don't want it" and then was UPSET by the fact that he never took their relationship public bugged the shit out of me. As he points out in that final confrontation, other people in school knew something was going on with them. It's not like it was a secret that could ever fully be kept. And if he was so worried about his own reputation, he probably would have distanced himself from her sooner as people became aware of their connection. Lee was the one who made herself the outsider, who didn't feel like she could or should approach him outside of their late night visits, and then put all of the responsibility on him. It didn't seem right, or fair, and I was really upset by her for that. Then, when you added her feelings towards Martha into the mix (Martha expressed skepticism over Cross ever being her actual boyfriend, so of COURSE Lee herself then never thought she was worthy of being his girlfriend, even after they started hooking up), I was just over her damn pity party, and her willingness to blame everyone else while taking no responsibility of her own for the way things played out.I think the other thing that really stood out to me in the book was Lee's relationship with her parents. It stood out in a way that made me uncomfortable, but more because, again, I felt what was happening was really relatable. Lee's experience at boarding school distanced herself from her parents earlier than would have been the case otherwise, but her emotions regarding her parents, and the way she felt other people viewed her or her family seemed really relatable. The weekend of the parent visit at the school was so painful to read at times -- the way she was embarrassed by her parents, the fight with her dad -- and yet I can't imagine an adolescent that hasn't gone through a time like that in their life. Granted, Lee had the added layer of being at a boarding school surrounded by rich kids when she herself was not rich, but the rest of it still felt true. There is that phase that you experience where all of a sudden your parents go from being these cool people, to being incredibly embarrassing humans who couldn't possibly know a thing about you. You cringe when they say the wrong thing in front of your friends, and start to think you know so much more than they do. That, of course, is not true -- and eventually you come to realize you were not nearly as cool or right as you thought you were -- but those feelings and that changing view of the people who raised you seems pretty universal.
Anyway...fair or not, the book lost a star because Lee annoyed the crap out of me sometimes. But...I felt like this book really captures a certain time of life (and in a very specific place) remarkably well. I really did enjoy it, and it made me remember being a teenager and think about the way I would have viewed things at that age compared to my current adult perspective.
A waste of time. I never once related to this protagonist. In fact, at one point, when she gets slapped in the face - I was thrilled. An author on the back of the book compared her to Holden Caulfield and I don't believe that is true one bit. I never once despised Holden. Ever.
I'm honestly not sure if this girl ever learned anything. Or experienced any kind of growth.
I'm honestly not sure if this girl ever learned anything. Or experienced any kind of growth.
Don't bother reading the synopsis: what you really need to know about this book is the way Sittenfeld brings every character to life. Her descriptions of everything - but especially the characters, even the insignificant ones - are incredible. If creative writing had textbooks with answers in the back the way that math textbooks do, Sittenfeld's descriptions would be there. I would have thought these were her memoirs.
Didn't actually finish this book because I stopped caring about the characters
I wanted to smack the main character of this book and then smack myself for continuing to read it.
I almost gave up on this book halfway through. Sittenfeld is a talented writer who has a great ability to make you really feel like you are in the places she describes. She also gets rights inside the head of a very insecure teenager. The problem with this is that I didn't like Lee and I didn't care much about her or her prep school world. I'm glad I at least speed-read the last half, though, to see a little bit of older Lee's reflections.
4/ Compulsively readable, it brought me back to high school in so many odd ways. Lee's voice is so strong; I understand why people don't like the character, much like you wouldn't like most teenagers, but Sittenfeld writes her to perfection. I liked the structure of the novel and how it unfolded, propelled by Lee's angst and unsureness and juxtaposed with what she perceives as her all-together and better off classmates. She often moves in and out of events not learning the obvious lesson or takeaway, and isn't that true to youth-- the lessons don't come in the moments that forge us, but in later reflection. Coming of age ain't easy.