Leigh’s psych classes at Stiles College do little to help her understand why sex still doesn't seem like a good idea with her brainy, long-term boyfriend, why she can’t stop thinking about his sweet, guitar-playing roommate and why her competitive classmates care so much about making her look stupid. A classic romantic-comedy formula feels fresh thanks to Leigh’s witty, semi-slacker narration, adorably kooky persona and background—her parents read tarot cards and run a business as spiritual advisors. Leigh’s breakup with the pretentious beau sends her into a dark period of self-pity, and even a titillating road trip with Nate (the one!) can’t quite snap her out of it. Readers will speed through the final pages, looking for that fantastic kiss that will bring Nate and Leigh together. The college experience dominates much of the book; older teens looking ahead might enjoy anticipating their time away from home, but younger readers won’t relate. Leigh’s concern with sexual readiness will leave readers of all ages doing a little self-analysis and thinking about their own decisions. (Fiction. 16 & up)
Pub Date: Aug. 11, 2009
ISBN: 978-1-4231-1457-4
Page Count: 336
Publisher: Disney-Hyperion
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 1, 2009
BOOK REVIEW
A quirky cast and some heavy issues never quite mesh in this ineffective tale about a teenager who discovers some ugly truths about her small town in 1961. Despite having lived in Quiver, Oklahoma, her entire life, Frannie Driscoll doesn’t know that her town is segregated until Raymond Chisholm and his daughter, Celeste, arrive for a brief stay. Disturbed by the way Celeste, the school’s only African- American student, is shunned and insulted, Frannie makes awkward overtures that are coolly received, but soon result in friendship. After dropping hints about her father’s research, Celeste shows Frannie a hidden room in the attic of her house and later relates a horrifying tale of Ku Klux Klan atrocities in Quiver in the 1920s. For no obvious reason, Grove keeps present prejudice and past racism separate, disassociating the contemporary cast from any taint of the Klan, even though it’s logical to think that some of the area’s white families had ancestors who were members. A subplot involving Frannie’s mother and a sexist employer only muddies the waters; a protest that Celeste’s classmates mount comes as a surprise, considering their earlier behavior; and the irony is anything but subtle when Celeste is cut from the school choir just before a statewide competition that is, predictably, won by an integrated group. Celeste—beautiful, mature, worldly, and a great singer—comes close to being a type; Frannie’s other friends are an engagingly diverse lot, which lightens the ship, but not enough to keep it afloat. (Fiction. 11-13)
Pub Date: June 1, 1999
ISBN: 0-399-23207-9
Page Count: 218
Publisher: Putnam
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 15, 1999
Sure to be shoplifted by teen delinquents, but also has a shot at adult cult status.
Teen girl troubles in the drug-addled suburbs of St. Louis.
Embree’s debut has roots in the punk-lit underground—drugs, disaffection, sex, violence and freakiness abound—but the weird innocence of its teen narrator makes it read like an uncensored YA novel. Angie is a fat, working class 16-year-old flirting with an eating disorder as she makes her way through adolescent terrors of identity and sexuality ratcheted up by drugs, isolation and violence. Her mother’s spoiled boyfriend has just moved in, and Angie’s best friend Shelby has declared she’s a lesbian. Angie and Shelby are relatively good kids committed to school, but when Shelby finds a girlfriend, Angie gets into trouble, alternately helped and hurt by her other friends. Embree assembles quite a cast: Heather, a sexy, one-breasted rich girl; Inez, the high school pot-head/dealer and guerilla performance artist; Carrie, a rich-girl anorexic with lesbian tendencies; Pike, a near-homeless teen dropout and sensitive artist; Troy and Mindy, two sexually sadistic rich kids; glamorous working-class Luann and her crystal-meth smoking hippie parents; and, most memorably, Shelby’s older sister Robyn, a tough-as-nails survivor who thrives on psychotic rage and deserves her own novel. Unfortunately, many of these characters remain mere sketches, as mysterious to the reader as they are to themselves. And while Embree casts a sharp eye on the complex lines of class and gender divisions (race is notably absent) that fuel the novel’s episodic violence, and raises fascinating questions about guilt and revenge, she allows Angie only a handful of insightful moments that are so moving and true, the reader can’t help but feel their absence elsewhere. There is the beginning of a much better book here, but readers who identify with the characters’ outsider status, or are drawn into the action as it rockets toward a climactic scene of Robyn-orchestrated retribution, probably won’t care.
Sure to be shoplifted by teen delinquents, but also has a shot at adult cult status.Pub Date: Oct. 10, 2005
ISBN: 1-933368-02-0
Page Count: 228
Publisher: Soft Skull Press
Review Posted Online: May 19, 2010
Kirkus Reviews Issue: July 15, 2005
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