I bought Curtis Sittenfeld’s Prep after reading an article in the August fiction issue of The Atlantic about her experiences as a first-time author. It must have really excited my interest because I bought it in hardback ($21.95). I’m annoyed that it is already out in paperback and not only have I not gotten around to reading it until now, I’m finding it sagging mightily — 177 pages into it (not quite half way) and there is no change in the tone nor in the first-person narrator’s attitude. But I have noted two passages:
Life is clearest when guided by ulterior motives . . . .
. . . I had at times believed that if my sadness were intense enough, it would magnetically draw a handsome boy to my room to comfort me, and that had served as an incentive, when alone, to lie around and weep.