It’s All About Us, a novel by Shelley Adina, brings out mixed emotions in me. So I guess I’ll start with the disclaimer. I’m a long, long way removed from high school crush days. Also, back when I was in high school we drank soda. If someone had offered me a mocha macchiato I would have thought he wanted to give me some kind of machete used for slicing coffee beans from their branches, perhaps.

And I was poor. So were all the other kids. This was back, even, before kids started getting their Nike’s stolen. Or their Air Jordans. (Whatever.) We wore ripped up elephant bell jeans with suede waffle stompers. And no one wanted to steal those puppies.

So here I am thirty-some years later and I’m reading a book about a rich girl at a boarding school full of rich kids. They drive expensive cars and they rub shoulders with stars. And our girl’s problem? The thing that is supposed to make me root for her?

She. . .uh. . .she wants to be popular.

Color me unsympathetic. And know that when I say the writing is compelling and the dialogue is great, I’m not saying that because I want to give the author a break. I don’t love the book, but the truth is that it’s very easy to read and the author is quite talented.

If you are a teen girl and you like reading about teen girls having crushes and longing for riches and beauty and popularity, and I suspect most teen girls do like to read about such things, then you’ll like this book.

Here’s an excerpt that will give you a glimpse of how well the dialogue flows and how fun this book is to read.

“Did it ever occur to you that the only fun those girls get is from making other people miserable?”

“That’s not true.” Not entirely. “The whole committee is working for a good cause. I’ll get community service credits. We need twenty hours every term, you know.”

Gillian sighed. “Missing the point.”

Don’t care. “Are you coming to lunch?”

The book is witty, and it moves fast. The author assumes her readers are not idiots and she doesn’t over explain, but she puts everything into context so that even if we’ve never heard of the designers she refers to, we understand the point she’s making.

Another good thing about the book, I think, is that the author is writing about things girls want to read about and she’s doing it from a Christian worldview. The publisher makes no bones about the fact that these books are the Christian versions of the Gossip Girl books. Well compare covers, for starters:

And then there’s this from the publisher:

Young Adult Fiction is Heating Up!

All About Us is sophisticated, edgy and relevant for today’s high school teens

That kind of language makes me want to rebel. Sophisticated, edgy, and relevant mean different things to different people. After reading the book did I find it sophisticated? Um. I think shallow might be a better word here. Edgy? Not for most teens, probably. Relevant? Well, if you’re super rich, and beautiful and have no real problems, maybe.

But the press release continues:

This fresh new series is sure to be a page turner for any girl who wants a book that is trendy, sophisticated, and relevant. Written in Adina’s realistic and quirky style, the books give readers a peek into the sometimes intimidating but always fascinating life of high school—with the added impact of a spiritual worldview.

Now this is where I’m torn. Yes, girls are reading gossip girl books and they are full of sex. Graphic, hot tub sex scenes and more, I’ve heard. And I do want girls to have an alternative to that. I do want someone to look at teen sex through Christian glasses and write a story about how Christian girls deal with sex. Because, let’s face it, girls, Christian or otherwise, are all thinking about sex these days. Unless you are an isolationist home schooler (in which case you aren’t reading this review) your daughters are thinking about sex and dreaming about the hot guy at school. My own daughter is home schooled and more naive than most and she hasn’t escaped the influence of our sexually preoccupied society. No, she is a regular girl with a crush of her own on a dorky kid at youth group that she thinks is cute and funny.

But here’s my problem with it’s all about us. It sets out to deliver a sex book with “the added impact of a spiritual worldview” and ends up not working as a sex book or as a Christian book or as a compelling story.

But I’ve carried on long enough today so I’ll get to my specific complaints tomorrow.

(go to part two)