#523 Virgins- Danielle Evens

#523 Virgins- Danielle Evens

Erica and Jasmine are high school girls from the suburbs in Westchester. This is 1996, the summer Tupac died. Like most teenagers they spend their time talking about their sexual experiences or the ones they’d like top have. They have a “safe” friend Michael that they aren’t involved with but he’s good to have around.

Ready for a real experience, they take their fake IDs and go clubbing in New York. Jasmine is more outgoing and a little more open to the advances of the older men, but they are both in way over their heads. Erica believes that safe doesn’t exist that the wave of peer pressure will knock you down no matter how hard you fight it. She doesn’t see the obvious choice right in front of her, or maybe  she sees it too late.

Rating: 7-7-6-6 Total= 26

#265 It Will Be Awesome Before Spring- Antonio Ruiz-Camacho

#265 It Will Be Awesome Before Spring- Antonio Ruiz-Camacho

A group of Mexican youths come of age, they are planning a trip to Italy in the spring. As rumors spread of dangers retuning to their city, they enjoy the excitement of more freedom that only comes with age.

“It is the year we meet people that don’t live in the same neighborhoods as us…It is the year we get to know real artists who rent studios in dangerous districts on the other side of the city, and it is the year we socialize with historians and anthropologists and performance artists and book editors who live paycheck to paycheck and don’t have cars… It is a new unexplored world within the same city we were born and have always lived, and every time we venture into it we feel as if we’re crossing an invisible fence, trespassing into a forbidden side of ourselves; messier, wilder sexier.”

I lose interest in these characters as we learn of their rich-kid tendencies and life outlook. Maybe it’s my own bias I’m projecting on it, but they seem to be pretty spoiled and sheltered. I don’t see a massage buried anywhere in here, perhaps that’s on purpose. Not every story needs a message, but without one, this story falls a bit hollow.

Rating: 6-5-6-6 Total= 23

#181 The Most Girl Part of You- Amy Hempel

#181 The Most Girl Part of You- Amy Hempel

Two adolescent best friends, one girl who lost her father years ago, and one boy who lost his mother 8 days ago. Big Guy is more than just a friend, he has been embraced by her mother as “The Man of the House.” She takes care of him, feeds him and welcomes him to the house.

The two teenagers maneuver through that uncomfortable period of attraction between lifelong best friends. What lines can be crossed, what lines should be crossed?

Hempel writes nostalgia very well. This somehow reminds me of my childhood even though non of the details match.

Notable Passage: “I mean someone that good-looking tells you what to do, you pretty much do what he says.”

Rating: 7-6-8-6 Total= 27