Author: Claire LaZebnik
Publisher: Harper Teen
Date: 2011
Source: purchased
My
grade: B
At Coral Tree Prep in Los Angeles, who your parents are can make or break you. Cast in point:
- As the son of Hollywood royalty, Derek Edwards is pretty much prince of the school--not that he deigns to acknowledge many of his loyal subjects.
- As the daughter of the new principal, Elise Benton isn't exactly on everyone's must-sit-next-to-at-lunch list.
When Elise's beautiful sister catches the eye of the prince's best friend, Elise gets to spend a lot of time with Derek, making her the envy of every girl on campus. Except she refuses to fall for any of his rare smiles and instead warms up to his enemy, the surprisingly charming social outcast Webster Grant. But in this hilarious tale of fitting in and flirting, not all snubs are undeserved, not all celebrity brats are bratty, and pride and prejudice can get in the way of true love for only so long. (picture and description from www.goodreads.com)
At Coral Tree Prep in Los Angeles, who your parents are can make or break you. Cast in point:
- As the son of Hollywood royalty, Derek Edwards is pretty much prince of the school--not that he deigns to acknowledge many of his loyal subjects.
- As the daughter of the new principal, Elise Benton isn't exactly on everyone's must-sit-next-to-at-lunch list.
When Elise's beautiful sister catches the eye of the prince's best friend, Elise gets to spend a lot of time with Derek, making her the envy of every girl on campus. Except she refuses to fall for any of his rare smiles and instead warms up to his enemy, the surprisingly charming social outcast Webster Grant. But in this hilarious tale of fitting in and flirting, not all snubs are undeserved, not all celebrity brats are bratty, and pride and prejudice can get in the way of true love for only so long. (picture and description from www.goodreads.com)
Initial
reaction
This novel
was like a movie version of your favorite book.
It was good, but it just wasn’t as satisfying as the original.
Cover story
Meh.
What’s the
Story?
So, this is
a re-telling of Pride and Prejudice. And
I am a huge, huge, huge Jane Austen fan.
So of course, I felt that I needed to read this one.
I liked
it. It was very close to the
original. In fact, in some ways, it was
almost too close to the original. But,
where Jane Austen really fleshed out her storyline, Claire LaZebnik sort of
glossed over things. Honestly, I think I
probably enjoyed this book BECAUSE I had read the original. When a major plot point showed up, I had Jane
Austen’s original astute observations to go back to, because there was not a
lot of that type of thing in this book.
This was a
very quick read. It is only 179 pages,
so I read it in almost one sitting, except that I finally fell asleep reading
in bed. Not because it was boring, but
because I’m old. The book managed to
capture all the major occurrences from the original story, but it really hopped
quickly from one to the other. At 179
pages, there was definitely room to expand and that’s really what the author
needed to do.
I liked the
characters, but mostly because I liked Jane Austen’s characters. It was easy to spot who was whom in the story
and this actually did a good job of setting up modern day examples of the
happenings from the original book.
I enjoyed
this one, but probably because I love the original Pride and Prejudice. I’m not sure how it would come across to
someone who hasn’t read the original.
It’s definitely not better than Ms. Austen’s, but it was a quick, fun
read.
The
Soundtrack
King of
Anything by Sara Bareilles
Sort Of by
Ingrid Michaelson
Change of
Season by Sweet Thing
Can’t Take
My Eyes Off of You by Muse
I Hate
Myself for Loving You by Joan Jett
I’d Rather
Be With You by Joshua Radin
The Final
Grade
My grade for
this one is a B. It was cute and fun and
fans of Pride and Prejudice will enjoy watching the comedy of errors play out
in modern times while those that are not fans of Jane Austen might find
themselves wondering what the original is like.
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