My Most Excellent Year
I read this in my YA book club. Collectively, we described it as a fairy tale, a realistic portrayal of teens, an unrealistic portrayal of teens, a happy Christmas book, laugh-out-loud funny and (overwhelmingly) a darn good book. Now, understand, we’ve read a lot of downers lately, so a book about three intelligent, cool teens who star in musicals, fall in love, obsess about baseball, champion political causes and make the dreams of a deaf kid come true kind of hit the spot.
The novel is told through a series of letters, emails and instant messages from the three main characters (T.C., Augie and Alejandra), their parents and some other (surprisingly cool) adults in their lives. The format works well and lends a fast pace to what appears to be a beefy read. In the first half, the main story revolves around Augie’s coming out and T.C.’s attempts to woo Alejandra. The second half focuses on Hucky, a six-year-old deaf orphan who is obsessed with Mary Poppins and can’t understand why she won’t come and live with him.
Kluger manages to combine the realistic and fantastic, the too good to believe and the super believable into an enjoyable, feel good novel that will challenge readers to create some Mary Poppins magic in their own lives.
DweebMeter: 5/5
Links
Jul 15, 2008 at 10:37 pm
The publicity department at Penguin forwarded me the link to this blog because they knew I’d appreciate it.
This is one of the few reviews I’ve ever gotten in which the novel in question is perceived exactly the way I’d intended: it’s indeed a realistic portrayal of teens and an unrealistic portrayal of teens; both realistic and fantastic; and too good to believe and super-believable–all at the same time. More often than not, readers will open a book with one inflexible mindset or another, which precludes them from fully inhabiting the singular world that was created for the particular story and characters. My thanks to your book club for embracing these apparent contradictions and recognizing the very real world in which T.C., Augie, Alejandra, and Hucky live.
–Steve Kluger
Jul 16, 2008 at 1:07 am
Wow, it’s always exciting to get an author comment on my blog! I admit, I’m a little tingly
Jul 16, 2008 at 1:07 pm
(steve kluger is cool.)
Jul 16, 2008 at 1:50 pm
And, you did such a great job of summing up our observations into a very well-written review!
Aug 7, 2008 at 10:56 pm
[...] the reviews: Book Dweeb, Bookshelves of Doom, Carlie, a hundred visions and revisions, Jen Robinson, Midwestern Lodestar, [...]
Nov 2, 2010 at 7:32 pm
OH MY GOSH! This book was amazing! Colectively it took me 15 (approximately) hours to read it. And if “Book Dweeb” Is reading this… Thumbs up for the review!” And Steven Kluger, if you are reading this… HOLY CRAP! I L-O-V-E-D this book. You couldn’t have made it any better. Except for the fact there’s not a sequel. That is the only thing that I found disappointing.
Like the Hershey’s Dark Chocolate ad; “Special is saying it mildly”