SarahJanet's Books

Prep

Prep by Curtis Sittenfeld

I took this out of the library several months ago after hearing a number of recommendations for it, but never got around to reading it. Fortunately, I was lent a copy while in Vancouver, and I started reading it at the airport on my way home. I read it the whole flight (we didn’t have the fancy tvs on the back of our seats this time, alas!), and was finished about 15 hours after getting home. In other words, it was a quick read.

It was a good book with an agonizingly believable protagonist. It was hard not to start skimming at some points when the awkward high school moments got to be too much. The author made the decision to write it from the perspective of the post-high school character, and it was a relief in a lot of ways because there were moments where I really wasn’t sure she was going to live through high school.

Although the main character was extremely three-dimensional and believable, many of the secondary characters were left a little flat. Part of that, I’m sure, was intentional to show just how immersed in herself Lee, the main character, is, but it makes the story somewhat less enjoyable. Martha, Lee’s roommate and best friend, is central to most of the story, but while we are repeatedly told that they are best friends, we never really get much of a sense of why. Cross, the object of Lee’s affections for all four years, never gets much beyond the stereotype of the popular guy. It’s a shame, because the tastes we get of their personalities are intriguing, but we never seem to get the whole story. Without the secondary characters, the story lacks something, leaving what could be a great book merely a good book. It’s good, no question, but it comes close to great a few times and it’s always a shame when books miss the mark like that.

posted by SarahJanet @ 3:00 PM