[.ca] Downers Grove (ISBN 0802137938)

bad idea:
I really wanted to like this book. It was recommended to me and I read the back and got excited. However, as soon as I started it, I knew something was wrong. I couldn't get a clear picture of any of the characters, and only saw a middle-aged guy trying to present teenage girls by using embarrassingly inappropriate pop-culture references. I never figured out what kind of girls Chrissie and Tracy were really supposed to be. Were they generic teenyboppers obsessed with hair and makeup? Counter-cultural punk/alternative/goth outcasts? Sharp-witted critics of society? My confusion began when Chrissie said that Tracy got her into hair and stuff like that, but also "started \oher\c as a vegan," which didn't seem realistic for either one of their characters, and which ended up making the author sound particularly stupid considering Chrissie went on to talk about all the milk she put in her coffee and oatmeal (vegans don't eat dairy products). I read the whole thing in a few hours because I was curious as to whether it might get better. It didn't. Its plot was slightly intriguing for a second, because I wanted to know whether the girls would die or go to jail. It wasn't until I finished the whole thing that I realized that there hadn't been any character development or plot development...at the end, I still didn't have a grasp on who the girls were or what they had been through (except in a vague, generic way), I didn't believe in Chrissie's relationship with Bobby at all, and I wondered why the mom and brother had even been put into the book in the first place, considering they were just one-sided cardboard cutouts in the background. Actually, that's pretty much what all of the characters were except for Chrissie, who was too contradictory to be one-sided. Apparently, this author doesn't know that throwing in a few names of 90s rock bands, trying to describe teenage girl fashion in great detail and using the word "mosh" are not substitutes for creating likeable, realistic characters or writing a story that doesn't read like a montage of bad generic teenage romance, action and horror films. I am a huge fan of young adult fiction novels and am usually not that picky or critical of them. I guess I hadn't read a really bad one until now.

Not Dickens, But Not Bad Either:
Right before the Christmas Break, a classmate of mine asked our senior English teacher what she planned to read over the break. She, off the top of her head replied, "Oh, this Stephen King novel I've been meaning to finish." We gasped. This, the woman who forced _Crime and Punishment_, _A Portrait of the Artist As A Young Man_ and _Hamlet_ down our sometimes reluctant (but in hindsight, very grateful) throats, was going to read Stephen King! She looked at us, smiled and said, "You gotta have your Twinkie reads." And that is what _Downer's Grove_ is: a Twinkie read. Not too complex, but entertaining. I could see someone reading this while snowed-in for a few days or relaxing on the beach. You can read it in one sitting (it's not too long), or pick it up and put down while you do your laundry (you can pick it up days apart and still find your place, as I did). And it's important to have those reads. To relax. To be entertained. To take a study break every few hours. Not every book has to be _War and Peace_. The plot is rather simple: Crystal is avoiding the senior curse where one senior dies before graduation while working our her feelings about her long-gone father, her new boyfriend (kinda boyfriend) and her mother's new boyfriend. The Booklist review pretty much gives the meat of the plot. While it seems like it could be rather unremarkable, the dialogue is witty and the characters have interesting personality quirks (Tracy, Crystal's friend, loves Hole and Crystal's brother). However, those qualities are often the book's shortcomings. The dialogue reminds me of _Buffy: The Vamire Slayer_: witty but unrealistic. I've never been to the Chicago suburbs, but I doubt everyone there has such a quick tongue. Also, the book is uber-contemporary. The girls listen to Hole and Nine Inch Nails. Not that those are bad bands, but I wonder if readers twenty years from now will know who/what those are. But the one truly compelling qualitiy is Hornburg's portrayal of teenage girls. Being a Michael (appartently a guy), he has the unusual talent of wrting from a place he is supposedly unfamiliar. These girls come to life and at times it is hard to believe that was written by someone who had never been there before. The girls giggle and plot how they are going to meet the guys they like, not run over to them and fling their clothes off. The girls have other interests besides their weight or looks or boys. The girls approach their problems the way girls do, not the way adult men may like to think they do. As for the geographical inaccuracies that other readers pointed out: not being from the area myself, I had no clue. Hornburg could have made up the whole town and I wouldn't have been the wiser. This book can be put down and picked up two weeks later with little review. Can be read in one sitting. Won't make you think too deep, but will entertain you. So, depending on your mood this could be a great book. Actually, a great Twinkie read. So just relax and...Yummy!

Not Bad:
Reading this book was an adventure. I didn't like how it just ended, that there was no more to say. I did enjoy this book, Chrissie's outlook and alot of the dialogue is what made me enoy this book more. I recommend it!

Embarrassingly inaccurate:
This book promises to be about two things: (a) the mindset of the suburban American teenager and (b) the town in the title. The book was barely entertaining. Being quite aware of things our police has to handle I sincerely believe that the author has blown the antics of point (a) way beyond proportion. Point (b) is more embarrassing for the author and most irritating for the reader because of glaring mistakes in the geography, as several other locals have pointed out. It may be excusable out of respect to invent a St. John's in neighbouring Lisle, but there's no need to cross the Burlington tracks on Maple on the way back if you live on 63rd. A simple look at a map would have refreshed memories..... Even though certain aspects of the white settlement are disconcerting in general, Pierce Downer and the other early settlers actually had a quite amicable relationship with the local Potawatomi (not: Pottawatami) Indian tribe, which went as far as the tribal elders throwing in a good word for the settlers during the Black Hawk war. Chicago also gets its share of goofs. The trains in the downtown area (The Loop) are called "El" (more often just "L") because they run on "elevated" tracks, not because they are electric ones. This can be found by cursory inspection of tourist guide material. Most of these irritants are found within the first handful of chapters. I may be seeing things too rational, but when an author puts the name of a real town on a book and makes it an integral part of the story he better get the setting right. I am sure his current neighbors in glorious N.Y.C. would be just as annoyed with such ignorance about their own locality. Certainly, most readers will not be from the area and will ignore the duds. Without them, the book provides some light entertainment, perhaps.

Dead On:
I grew up in Chicago's Western suburbs and can say Hornburg evokes that place dead-on. I don't have anything against my hometown, but I'm not living there now for a reason. I remember being a 17-year-old girl and all the confusion and angst that comes with that (which, contrary to my expectations, this male author articulates artfully well). And I remember being that girl in a place so stultifying that we felt no qualms about taking risks. The main character, Chrissie, takes risks throughout the novel, too, and while some plot points were more believable than others, I never doubted her motivation. Now, this is not a perfect novel--if I were his editor we would have had a couple pow-wows for sure. But for what this novel does best--characterization, dialogue, setting--I think it's definitely worth a read, especially if you are a teenage girl at heart.