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iffles 's review for:
The Field Guide to the North American Teenager
by Ben Philippe
I'm having a hard time writing this review, because I'm having a hard time defining what it is I just read. It's not really a romance, though there was a love interest involved... I think it was more about friendships and growing up. A real coming of age book in modern America.
Norris is a black French Canadian, transplanted by his mother to Austin, Texas in the middle of his Junior year. Plunked into the epitome of the American High School Experience he has seen on movies and TV he starts mentally categorizing everyone he meets - the jocks, the cheerleaders, the loners, and the manic pixie dream girl.
Throughout the book, though, Norris starts to discover that no one fits into those boxes so nicely. The rude dumb jock starts being nice to him, the loner becomes a friend, he starts working at the cheerleader's family restaurant, and suddenly all the lines are being blurred. So where exactly does he fit in? And when he manages to mess everything up and have his life crashing down around him, will he be able to recover?
I liked Norris. I related a bit to his moving to a new place (though the last move of my childhood was right before college, so not exactly the same. Before that, though, I was in middle school, which was pretty horrific) and needing to adjust. And his sometimes-snarky attitude could be funny and somehow charming at times. I also related to how much he despised the Texas heat and how much it made him sweat, ha.
I sometimes felt the lack of real compelling story to pull me through to the end made it a little slow-going at times, but overall I really enjoyed this book and all the aspects of being a "new kid" and the "Black kid" it touched on.
Norris is a black French Canadian, transplanted by his mother to Austin, Texas in the middle of his Junior year. Plunked into the epitome of the American High School Experience he has seen on movies and TV he starts mentally categorizing everyone he meets - the jocks, the cheerleaders, the loners, and the manic pixie dream girl.
Throughout the book, though, Norris starts to discover that no one fits into those boxes so nicely. The rude dumb jock starts being nice to him, the loner becomes a friend, he starts working at the cheerleader's family restaurant, and suddenly all the lines are being blurred. So where exactly does he fit in? And when he manages to mess everything up and have his life crashing down around him, will he be able to recover?
I liked Norris. I related a bit to his moving to a new place (though the last move of my childhood was right before college, so not exactly the same. Before that, though, I was in middle school, which was pretty horrific) and needing to adjust. And his sometimes-snarky attitude could be funny and somehow charming at times. I also related to how much he despised the Texas heat and how much it made him sweat, ha.
I sometimes felt the lack of real compelling story to pull me through to the end made it a little slow-going at times, but overall I really enjoyed this book and all the aspects of being a "new kid" and the "Black kid" it touched on.