Going Nowhere Faster
Grade 8 Up—Seventeen-year-old Stan Smith, a chess champion and former child prodigy, shirks most of his scholarly and social responsibilities, instead choosing to spend his time working as an underpaid clerk in a video store. His hippie vegan parents, though well meaning, only embarrass him and make his self-defeating attempts to wrest control of his life all the more pathetic. Paths to recovery do surface only to be thwarted by one of the novel's offbeat characters or through Stan's own mistakes, which result in a seemingly directionless plot that eventually fizzles away. The narrative style follows suit, and the various lists and imaginary film treatments composed by Stan do little to infuse any personality into the story, let alone aid in moving it along. Moreover, these conceits feel stale and overused, especially when compared to the ingenious and hilarious characterizations contained in John Green's similarly themedAn Abundance of Katherines(Dutton, 2006). What results is a half-baked and formulaic exploration of loserdom that lacks any of the dumpy, ironic, underdog charm that could raise it toNapoleon Dynamiteheights.—Hillias J. Martin, New York Public LibraryCopyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.