The perks of being a wallflower happened. :)Like the book says, you kind of feel infinite after reading something this good. 3 hrs of sitting on the toilet seat and yes, I felt infinite. ( Sounds totally not what I mean, but I hope you get me. :P )
This might be my favorite book. It's so perfect, it's crazy.
Mainly it's about this boy, Charlie who's going to high school and is going through a hard time having lost his friend Michael who committed suicide. So he starts writing letters to us readers telling us about his experience through high school. The book as such does not have a 'plot', it's very elusive in the beginning. It's weird how I thought Charlie was a girl until like the 3rd or 4th letter. :| (very weird). So Charlie goes through a lot of new experiences through high school which I cannot relate to as such because our life here is a lot different. So, it was all a little overwhelming at the beginning.
This made it for a very interesting and intriguing read, I think. Very fast paced.
The story stresses upon a lot of things like drug abuse, alcohol abuse, sex, family issues, homosexuality. Throughout the story Charlie is a shy, naive, innocent boy. Emotionally distraught most of the time. He is a wallflower which means that he kind of blends into the background and observes people. He is somewhat a crybaby and has a hard time pleasing himself. He's someone who works hard to please people and cherishes friendships. He comes across as a nervous kid and has many things going wrong with him which he doesn't get to know until the end.
Though he goes through like a blast of things through his first year, he remains genuine and doesn't turn cynical or jaded though all of it. Mainly the book is so realistic, there's no usual 'hero' or a 'villain'. It's all so real. The people. Their experiences. And just growing up as characters. Coming of age, I suppose.
I like the characters of Sam and Patrick. They kind of help Charlie get exposed to all that goes on for an American high-school kid I think. The thing is that the characters kind of became family for me and his friends became my friends because they were characterized so beautifully, like I said before, the book is so real. It makes you feel so good to be involved in his life, to read his personal dairy. The whole group of friends are somewhat like the indie kids of the 90's. So there's a lot of references of Nirvana, the Smiths, pop culture basically of that era.
I especially liked his English teacher 'Bill' who gave him books to read. Made me wish I had someone like that, to give me books and later would listen to me rant about them.
So basically the book is somewhat like a classic. You should read it. I feel it could have been a book in our high school curriculum if not for some graphic scenes and swearing that goes on. The whole book leads to a climax and I think the last 20 pages is where everything kind of starts to make sense. It makes you want to live life right now, to 'participate'. It's basically the book that you wish you had written because it's pure genius. It's a book that I will keep in my shelf and read it again and again not caring if it gets wrinkled or the pages get yellowed. Well, if you haven't read this book, I don't care if you have like an advanced copy of The Casual freaking Vacancy, read THIS.
And about the movie, I just saw the trailer and well I kind of kept on seeing it. No shame. The characters look a lot like I imagined. I'm looking forward to some scenes in specific.
Anyway, bye for now.
Be kind to one another, why did I even write that down? I'm so emotional right now.
Quoting from the book,
“So, I guess we are who we are for a lot of reasons. And maybe we'll never know most of them. But even if we don't have the power to choose where we come from, we can still choose where we go from there. We can still do things. And we can try to feel okay about them.”
SAM B.
PS: Thank you Antara, for the book. :)
