Scarlett Epstein Hates It Here

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Cross Veronica Mars with MTV's Daria, and you’ll get Scarlett Epstein, the snarky, judgmental, and often hilarious star of Scarlett Epstein Hates It Here , a witty and heartwarming novel that’s perfect for fans of David Arnold’s Mosquitoland and Kody Keplinger’s The Duff. "Absolutely delightful, the kind of book you'll be reading for an hour before you realize you've been grinning the whole time." — Buzzfeed "A sparkling, unabashedly feminist debut." — * Kirkus Reviews , Starred Review "Rainbow Rowell’s Fangirl meets Harriet the Spy* in this coming-of-age tale filled with emotional resonance."— TeenVogue.com Meet Scarlett Epstein, BNF (Big Name Fan) in her online community of fanfiction writers, world-class nobody at Melville High. Her best (read: only) IRL friends are Avery, a painfully shy and annoyingly attractive bookworm, and Ruth, her pot-smoking, possibly insane seventy-three-year-old neighbor. When Scarlett’s beloved TV show is canceled and her longtime crush, Gideon, is sucked out of her orbit and into the dark and distant world of Populars, Scarlett turns to the fanfic message boards for comfort. This time, though, her subjects aren’t the swoon-worthy stars of her fave series—they’re the real-life kids from her high school. Scarlett never considers what might happen if they were to find out what she truly thinks about them...until a dramatic series of events exposes a very different reality than Scarlett's stories, forever transforming her approach to relationships—both online and off. ** From School Library Journal Gr 9 Up-High school junior Scarlett is heavily involved with the Lycanthrope High TV show's online fandom, writing fan fiction and live tweeting the show. In real life, she is mostly invisible, hanging out with her supersmart best friend, Avery, and her elderly neighbor Ruth. When her favorite show is canceled, Scarlett and her online friends are devastated. And then her real life starts falling apart. The teen begins writing new fanfic, set in the Lycanthrope High world but based on events and people in the real world. She does not paint the most flattering portraits of them, so when her writing is discovered by people in her school, there are serious consequences. The initial impression of the book is of a quippy, good-time read. But as Scarlett's life takes a dive, the tone darkens. Breslaw includes Scarlett's fanfic, which is engaging to read, especially when she is stymied and writing in terrible clichés. Unfortunately, while the inclusion of the protagonist's work and Tumblr-speak feels fresh, many of the main ideas do not: a smart, pretty girl hiding her light; a rough-around-the-edges single mom with a heart of gold; an absent dad with a perfect new family; and a mean girl who is not so mean. The book feels uneven and loses steam toward the end, but it is a quick read that is still enjoyable. An abundance of scenes with teens drinking casually make this title more appropriate for high schoolers. VERDICT A fine additional purchase.-Geri Diorio, Ridgefield Library, CTα(c) Copyright 2011. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted. Review "Absolutely delightful, the kind of book you'll be reading for an hour before you realize you've been grinning the whole time. Sarcastic, hilarious, and secretly sensitive Scarlett will be immediately recognizable to anyone who spent their teenage years unsure of what they were doing or where they fit in (i.e., anyone who was ever a teenager).” — Buzzfeed "Though her life is full of good people—her mother, her best friend, Avery, her delightfully vinegary neighbor Ruth—who hold up loving mirrors to her most judgmental, emotionally distancing impulses, Scarlett stubbornly sees herself as an underachieving loner with a uniquely sophisticated read on the world…readers will quickly see what Scarlett doesn’t: that she pushes people away, that her underachievement is a pose, that she’s often thoughtlessly cruel and se