Title: The Perks of Being a Wallflower
Author: Stephen Chbosky
Genre: Young Adult, Contemporary
Length: 188
Rating: 2 Star
Description/Synopsis:
Charlie is a freshman.
And while he’s not the biggest geek in the school, he is by no means popular. Shy, introspective, intelligent beyond his years yet socially awkward, he is a wallflower, caught between trying to live his life and trying to run from it.
Charlie is attempting to navigate his way through uncharted territory: the world of first dates and mix tapes, family dramas and new friends; the world of sex, drugs, and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, when all one requires is that perfect song on that perfect drive to feel infinite. But he can’t stay on the sideline forever. Standing on the fringes of life offers a unique perspective. But there comes a time to see what it looks like from the dance floor.
The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a deeply affecting coming-of-age story that will spirit you back to those wild and poignant roller-coaster days known as growing up.
Review – MAY CONTAIN SPOILERS
I am having such a good run of books lately and this book is no exception.
I found this to be a very honest telling of what high school can be like for some. Its great big mess no matter who you are, you have dramas that you sometimes don’t even realize you have, and everything is just really hard in ways you don’t understand. Charlie has all these issues in his own way, and it is him dealing with these issues that makes up the plot. I use he word plot kind of loosely because there isn’t really a plot to the book in the sense that there are no huge and dramatic things that push the story along.
The story is presented to us through letter format where Charlie is writing to a friend who is unnamed throughout the book. I have no idea who this person is supposed to be. I think I missed some clue in the listening/reading to of this book because it seems like others worked it out but I am still in the dark. Despite me not getting the hints I really liked the way it was presented. I don’t normally like letter type stories, I am currently failing at reading two separate ones, but I found this super easy to follow and I enjoyed it.
Character wise I thought everyone had depth and were interesting in their own ways. I liked Charlie but I found him a but frustrating and just could not understand why he did some things the way he did them. The ones I liked the most were Sam and Patrick. I ADORED these two characters. Their energy for life and the way they feed off each other and breathe life into Charlie is just awesome. I could have just read a book about them.
The only negative right now that I can think of other than some stupid Charlie choices, I would suggest not doing the audio book for this one. The voice that was used is really annoying and ‘geeky’ voice while suiting, I found it very distracting at times and think it would probably be more enjoyable to just read the book.
I would suggest this book to anyone who likes a high school based book about people coming to understand themselves. While it was amazing, I don’t think this book is for everyone.
Till Next Time…
