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A review by katykelly
Enter Title Here by Naomi Kanakia
My top book of 2020 already - the most conniving and amorally wonderful narrator you'll ever come across.
This is now riding high in my 'what are your favourite ever YA books?' should anyone ask me. I can't recall just how I heard of it, probably on a 'what to read next' website, but boy am I glad I got myself a copy.
Young Adult fiction really does offer readers a wealth of characters, settings, genres and styles. It's one of the most exciting ages to be to discover fiction, with so many intelligent and innovative plots and protagonists you'll see in books. And THIS is, from the first, an exciting, wry and whip-smart glance at a high school. Schools done to death, you say? You won't say that after reading Enter Title Here.
Blackly funny, it's meta, it's ironic, it's self-referential - it's a unique narrative and gives us the most unforgettably zealous, self-centred and detached student you'll ever see on the page. Reshma is going to get to Stanford. Let's rephrase, she IS going to get to Stanford. Whatever it takes. And that, at her already-high-achieving school, means she needs to be class valedictorian. And to make her stand out - she needs a literary agent and a book.
Trawling through fiction for her age group, she determines the factors most likely to net her a book deal - she'll need to write a coming of age story about a girl who learns how to party, how to be cool, someone who gets a boyfriend and has sex. So she sets herself a timeline of how to go about achieving these things, to then write about them.
Intensely funny, I couldn't stop myself reading 'just one more' chapter constantly. I loved the fact that Reshma is Asian, that we see those stereotypes played with in herself and her parents and their family's experiences. There are some secondary characters that make their mark as well, some that appear to be archetypes from every teen movie you've ever seen, but actually do have a little depth to them and don't act as you'd expect. There's even a male version of a (not so) manic dream pixie potential love interest.
Reshma's 'journey' is both expected and gives some surprises: will she get into Stanford? Will she write that book? The side effects of high achieving, of taking performance enhancing drugs, of throwing the feelings of others under the bus, of cheating, of soulless drilling and learning by rote, they all feature thematically.
I didn't hate Reshma at all, I found her lack of sympathy for fellow humans amusing in the context of the book, as we are meant to. She is a remarkable literary creation, and I'd love to see her resurrected further along her timeline, see where life takes her.
This would be an excellent basis for discussions with older teenagers (mild sexual content, nothing graphic, but the themes will resonate more with those close to Reshma's own age).
Please please please read this. Adult or teen, you won't forget this book or protagonist.
This is now riding high in my 'what are your favourite ever YA books?' should anyone ask me. I can't recall just how I heard of it, probably on a 'what to read next' website, but boy am I glad I got myself a copy.
Young Adult fiction really does offer readers a wealth of characters, settings, genres and styles. It's one of the most exciting ages to be to discover fiction, with so many intelligent and innovative plots and protagonists you'll see in books. And THIS is, from the first, an exciting, wry and whip-smart glance at a high school. Schools done to death, you say? You won't say that after reading Enter Title Here.
Blackly funny, it's meta, it's ironic, it's self-referential - it's a unique narrative and gives us the most unforgettably zealous, self-centred and detached student you'll ever see on the page. Reshma is going to get to Stanford. Let's rephrase, she IS going to get to Stanford. Whatever it takes. And that, at her already-high-achieving school, means she needs to be class valedictorian. And to make her stand out - she needs a literary agent and a book.
Trawling through fiction for her age group, she determines the factors most likely to net her a book deal - she'll need to write a coming of age story about a girl who learns how to party, how to be cool, someone who gets a boyfriend and has sex. So she sets herself a timeline of how to go about achieving these things, to then write about them.
Intensely funny, I couldn't stop myself reading 'just one more' chapter constantly. I loved the fact that Reshma is Asian, that we see those stereotypes played with in herself and her parents and their family's experiences. There are some secondary characters that make their mark as well, some that appear to be archetypes from every teen movie you've ever seen, but actually do have a little depth to them and don't act as you'd expect. There's even a male version of a (not so) manic dream pixie potential love interest.
Reshma's 'journey' is both expected and gives some surprises: will she get into Stanford? Will she write that book? The side effects of high achieving, of taking performance enhancing drugs, of throwing the feelings of others under the bus, of cheating, of soulless drilling and learning by rote, they all feature thematically.
I didn't hate Reshma at all, I found her lack of sympathy for fellow humans amusing in the context of the book, as we are meant to. She is a remarkable literary creation, and I'd love to see her resurrected further along her timeline, see where life takes her.
This would be an excellent basis for discussions with older teenagers (mild sexual content, nothing graphic, but the themes will resonate more with those close to Reshma's own age).
Please please please read this. Adult or teen, you won't forget this book or protagonist.