Coming-of-Age Fiction

摘要

In the small town of Adamsville, AL, another school year is beginning and everyone knows what to expect. The same girls will be elected cheerleaders, the same teachers will inspire or irritate, and all hopes will be focused on the football team winning the state championship. That is until a new girl joins the junior class. Pretty, bright, and just a little mysterious, Carolyn Lessing disrupts the established order. Classmates who might never have turned into mean girls do, or did they? That's the question that troubles our narrator-a collective we, combining the voices of Lauren, Jessica, and Nicole, reluctant ladies-in-waiting to the popular set. In reliving the year, memories are probed, conflicting accounts are sifted, and all the insecurities and pressures of teen years lived under the constant scrutiny and instant judgements of social media are exposed. VERDICT Bannan's first novel takes a skillfully nuanced approach to the high school mean girls drama plot. No easy emotional pull of championing vindication for a victim here; expect instead to experience the unease of tangled intentions and perceptions that leave no clear answers while offering deep insights.