Book: The Perks of Being a Wallflower

The Perks of Being a Wallflower

by Stephen Chobsky

Length: 224

Format: Paperback
Price: Borrowed from a friend

How I heard about it: It's on my list.

Basic Premise: Fifteen-year-old Charlie navigates family issues, making new friends, and the complicated social waters of high school.

My Take: 5 out of 10 (scale here)

Ehhh.

That's pretty much what I thought of this book. See that mind-blowing premise I wrote? Yeah...that's because I have read this same story fifteen times, just with different details. It was strongly reminiscent of Looking for Alaska and Speak (although, I have to say, I did love Speak). I liked the epistolary structure and I really really liked Charlie. I also loved his English teacher, and how, from the very beginning of the school year, he noticed something different in Charlie and gave him books - good, perfect books that weren't necessarily reflective of things the boy was going through, but things to which he could make personal connections.

I was trying to figure out how to word what I didn't like, but it turns out I already did that when I wrote my review of Looking for Alaska:

I hate the seemingly incessant conviction among the young in books like this that life is about sex and drinking.  I am always surprised at the depth of this belief and the lengths young people will go to get it.  Perhaps it is because the boys I surrounded myself with when I was this age were Ricks and Jeffs and Sams and Jacobs and Tylers - they were just so good.  They loved me and cared about me, not what I could do for them or get for them.  I avoided the boys like the ones in this book like the plague and pray to GOD that my daughter does the same.  Perhaps my boys were naive, or perhaps I am naive.  Whatever the reason, it always leaves a very sour taste in my mouth.

^Same.

List Progress:

1. I Am Malala by Christina Lamb and Malala Yousafzai review here
2. The Perks of Being a Wallflower by Stephen Chbosky
3. The Handmaid’s Tale by Margaret Atwood review here
   
4. Thirteen Reasons Why by Jay Asher review here
5. The Glass Castle by Jeannette Walls
6. A Prayer for Owen Meany by John Irving review here
7. The Poisonwood Bible by Barbara Kingsolver review here
8.  Does My Head Look Big in This? by Randa Abdel-Fattah review here
9. The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Timeby Mark Haddon
10. Uglies by Scott Westerfeld (read before I started blogging)
11. The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao by Junot Díaz
12. Half of a Yellow Sun by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie review here
13. Speak by Laurie Halse Anderson (read before I started blogging)
14. Oryx and Crake by Margaret Atwood
15. Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close by Jonathan Safran Foer review here
16. Bossypants by Tina Fey
17. Jasper Jones by Craig Silvey
18. The Hunger Games by Suzanne Collins (read before I started blogging)
19. The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Monk Kidd (read before I started blogging)
20. Water for Elephants by Sara Gruen *abandoned*
21. Eleanor & Park by Rainbow Rowell review here
22. She’s Come Undone by Wally Lamb
23. Harry Potter by J.K. Rowling - can we have a moment for whoever created this list? "Harry Potter" is not a book. It's a series of books. Sheesh.
24. Looking for Alaska by John Green review here
25. The Book Thief by Markus Zuzak review here
26. The Kite Runner by Khaled Housseini review here