Prep: A Novel | 
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Product Description
Curtis Sittenfeld’s debut novel, Prep, is an insightful, achingly funny coming-of-age story as well as a brilliant dissection of class, race, and gender in a hothouse of adolescent angst and ambition.
Lee Fiora is an intelligent, observant fourteen-year-old when her father drops her off in front of her dorm at the prestigious Ault School in Massachusetts. She leaves her animated, affectionate family in South Bend, Indiana, at least in part because of the boarding school’s glossy brochure, in which boys in sweaters chat in front of old brick buildings, girls in kilts hold lacrosse sticks on pristinely mown athletic fields, and everyone sings hymns in chapel.
As Lee soon learns, Ault is a cloistered world of jaded, attractive teenagers who spend summers on Nantucket and speak in their own clever shorthand. Both intimidated and fascinated by her classmates, Lee becomes a shrewd observer of–and, ultimately, a participant in–their rituals and mores. As a scholarship student, she constantly feels like an outsider and is both drawn to and repelled by other loners. By the time she’s a senior, Lee has created a hard-won place for herself at Ault. But when her behavior takes a self-destructive and highly public turn, her carefully crafted identity within the community is shattered.
Ultimately, Lee’s experiences–complicated relationships with teachers; intense friendships with other girls; an all-consuming preoccupation with a classmate who is less than a boyfriend and more than a crush; conflicts with her parents, from whom Lee feels increasingly distant, coalesce into a singular portrait of the painful and thrilling adolescence universal to us all.
From the Hardcover edition.
Amazon.com Review
Curtis Sittenfeld's poignant and occassionally angst-ridden debut novel Prep is the story of Lee Fiora, a South Bend, Indiana, teenager who wins a scholarship to the prestigious Ault school, an East Coast institution where "money was everywhere on campus, but it was usually invisible." As we follow Lee through boarding school, we witness firsthand the triumphs and tragedies that shape our heroine's coming-of-age. Yet while Sittenfeld may be a skilled storyteller, her real gift lies in her ability to expertly give voice to what is often described as the most alienating period in a young person's life: high school. True to its genre, Prep is filled with boarding school stereotypes--from the alienated gay student to the picture perfect blond girl; the achingly earnest first-year English teacher and the dreamy star basketball player who never mentions the fact that he's Jewish. Lee's status as an outsider is further affirmed after her parents drive 18 hours in their beat-up Datsun to attend Parent's Weekend, where most of the kids "got trashed and ended up skinny-dipping in the indoor pool" at their parents' fancy hotel. Yet even as the weekend deteriorates into disaster and ends with a heartbreaking slap across the face, Sittenfeld never blames or excuses anyone; rather, she simply incorporates the experience into Lee's sense of self. ("How was I supposed to understand, when I applied at the age of thirteen, that you have your whole life to leave your family?") By the time Lee graduates from Ault, some readers may tire of her constant worrying and self-doubting obsessions. However, every time we feel close to giving up on her, Sittenfeld reels us back in and makes us root for Lee. In doing so, perhaps we are rooting for every high school student who's ever wanted nothing more than to belong. --Gisele Toueg
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Customer Reviews:
• Ambivalence: Just Didn't Care About Lee 30 October, 2008
I read this book as a book club selection, and while it was good for provoking conversation about our own high school experiences, I cannot say it contained much depth apart from liking or disliking each character.
Sittenfeld does a nice job of describing the typical teenage angst that most of us go through at some point in our lives; however, after four years of it, I grew tired of Lee. There was virtually no change in her attitude, despite several catalyst events to spur that.
When a book makes me severely dislike a character, I typically consider it a successful book. (i.e. Wuthering Heights... HATED Catherine, but Bronte is a genius for writing a character that anyone could loathe so much.) In general, while I may not have liked the character, I can't help but appreciate the author's efforts in writing someone so well. In "Prep" though, the development in Lee is missing, and it is her friends (acquaintances, rather) that remain the dynamic forces in her life.
The journalist arriving at the end, and Lee's subsequent "big reveal," feels like a bad version of deus ex machina, with some big event trying to wrap up a plot that lacked depth in the first place.
While indulgent simply for the sake of reminiscing, and for sympathizing with Lee's desire to fit in, I think Sittenfeld just missed the mark.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A306LC1OYQYHVP
• When I Think Back On All The Crap I Learned In High School... 18 November, 2008
I didn't want to like this book. It looked like cheesy chick-lit, and something about reading about the adolescent trials and tribulations of a working-class Hoosier girl named Lee...well, I got through being an adolescent working-class Hoosier girl named Lee once and I was not really interested in going through it again.
But I was blown away by how good a writer Sittenfeld is, and how well she captures the main character, who is usually incredibly unsympathetic and unlikeable, yet always believeable and never without possibility of redemption.
Lee Fiora isn't just selfish and snobbish and melodramatic...she's also very young. As a 14- to 18-year-old, she lacks the insight and perspective to realize that everyone else at the school has their own teenage problems equal or greater to her own. She hates the too-earnest young English teacher because she sees a lot of obvious similarities with herself...but doesn't realize that the other, more "popular" girls' hatred also stems from their own considerable fears and insecurities. As a freshman, Lee develops a mild crush on a senior girl named Gates Medowski and wonders if she might be gay (though the narrator in hindsight realizes that she did not want to have sex with Gates but wanted to BE Gates), but she's blind to the fact that her roommate Sin-Jun actually IS a lesbian. As for Lee's relationship with her sometimes and sort-of boyfriend Cross Sugarman, Sittenfeld has written one of the most spot-on and funniest descriptions of the mechanics of a first kiss since Flannery O'Connor's "Good Country People," and one of the most realistically prosaic deflowering scenes since Mary Karr's "Cherry."
Contrary to what some other reviewers have said, Lee DOES grow up a lot in this novel, just not while in high school. True to life, it takes some time for the lessons learned in high school to sink in. The story of her time at Ault is told by Lee as a 28- or 29-year-old woman who fully recognizes and owns up to her own adolescent self-absorption, yet is still close enough to it to recognize that if all these trivial matters were enough to once rule her life, they probably were not entirely trivial. In one scene at her favorite teacher's house (Lee is flunking math and has come over for extra tutoring), she aches for the teacher to ask about her boyfriend, about her friends, about anything but precalculus. The grown-up Lee says something about wondering why her teachers and adults didn't realize just how much teenagers really did want and respect their advice, even if they didn't always show it. The grown-up Lee becomes good friends with some of the students she was indifferent to or even hated at Ault (once they all grow up and shed their carefully crafted adolescent personas, though, true to life, some people NEVER change), but she and her inseparable best friend Martha drift apart over the years, with no particular reason for their split.
A lot of people have commented that "Prep" and its protagonist spend more time dealing with the minutinae and minefield of teenage social interactions and the actual rigorous academics of Ault School are barely existent in the storyline. The irony, of course, is that the social education IS the valuable preparation for adult life Lee Fiora got out of her boarding school education--she doesn't use calculus or Latin or Ancient Greek in her daily life, but she's got much keener insight into human motivations and relationships.
"Prep" came out not long after and is similar to in basic premise to Tom Wolfe's "I Am Charlotte Simmons," but while Wolfe's novel could be at best described as a noble failure, Sittenfeld knocks it out of the park.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A2OV9UDLHBL2QH
• Great 30 November, 2008
Title: Prep
Authors: Curtis Sittenfeld
Publisher: Random House
Reading Level: Young Adult
Released: November 2005
Rating: 4/5
Summary:
Lee Fiora is an intelligent, observant fourteen-year-old when her father drops her off in front of her dorm at the prestigious Ault School in Massachusetts. She leaves her animated, affectionate family in South Bend, Indiana, at least in part because of the boarding school's glossy brochure, in which boys in sweaters chat in front of old brick buildings, girls in kilts hold lacrosse sticks on pristine mowed athletic fields, and everyone sings hymns in chapel
As Lee soon learns, Ault is a cloistered world of jaded, attractive teenagers who spend summers on Nantucket and speak in their own clever shorthand. Both intimidated and fascinated by her classmates, Lee becomes a shrewd observer of-and, ultimately, a participant in-their rituals and mores. As a scholarship student, she constantly feels like an outsider and is both drawn to and repelled by other loners. By the time she's a senior, Lee has created a hard-won place for herself at Ault. But when her behavior takes a self-destructive and highly public turn, her carefully crafted identity within the community is shattered.
Ultimately, Lee's experiences-complicated relationships with teachers; intense friendships with other girls; an all-consuming preoccupation with a classmate who is less than a boyfriend and more than a crush; conflicts with her parents, from whom Lee feels increasingly distant, coalesce into a singular portrait of the painful and thrilling adolescence universal to us all.
Review:
I've heard this book was one of those books where you either love it or hate it. Me? I was closer to loving it then hating it. Actually I pretty much LOVED it, except for a few things that bothered me, but I'll get to those later.
When I first started Prep, I really didn't know what to expect. So I was kind of surprised by what happened in the novel, and not necessarily in a bad way. Lee was one of those girls who always felt left out, who thought she wasn't ugly nor pretty, smart nor dumb. So when she came to boarding school, I, well, I pitied Lee as a character. She was always so negative and didn't know how lucky she were. She was, shall I say, clueless. It was a bit annoying, but when I thought about, I think that it was necessary for Lee to be annoying in her character to fit the part in this novel. If that makes sense.
Throughout Lee's time at Ault, she grew. She grew so much, it was crazy. Every time a new chapter started, which was not a lot of times considering there were eight chapters and 400 pages in the book, Lee had grown up immensely. And I loved to see Lee grow up, actually I loved to see any character grow up, like through a long period time, in any book. Which is probably why I love the Jessica Darling Series so much. Anyway, back to Prep.
Sittenfeld's writing was close to impeccable. I really enjoyed her style of writing. Her writing made me think and it made me curious. I had no idea what would happen next. Something that bothered me was the ending, I was hoping for a little more, Lee was telling us what happened since she left Ault about everybody she ran into, but I really didn't know what happened to her. Also there were times in the novel when I got so frustrated with Lee were I just wanted to rip out the pages. but nonetheless, this was an excellent read that I highly recommend.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A3VHB7280FPC2C
• I Could Relate 05 November, 2008
I can't believe the mixed reviews for this book. I don't understand how some readers just did'nt get it, maybe they were so popular and socially adept in highschool that they could not relate. I certainly could relate to Lee on many levels. Did I like her? Not so much, but I could have been her in many cases. Is this hard to admit? Kind-of. I could relate to her need to over analyze everything and everyone. I could relate to her inability to respond well in most social situations. I could relate to her awkwardness, insecurity and lack of grace. I think this is called being a teenager. I certainly relate to the fact that in highschool one is consumed with, well, highschool. In those four years, highschool is your world, and it is all that matters. So many viewers didnt seem to get this and then wonder about the ending. After we are done highschool we realize it's a big world and there is more to life than, well, highschool. In many cases people complained how her four years seemed to shape her later life. I believe this to be true. Certainly highschool is a riveting time for many of us. It is a very intense experience and because of the development that happens to one while there, it can form you in many ways. Many girls firsts are in highschool, first love, first kiss, first sexual experience, etc. Of course these are so important in how you evolve and in who you become. It can determine how we relate to others in later life. Many a valuable lesson is learned in the time spent there. I could certainly relate to the time period. It did'nt have to be spelled out. She spoke of the lack of email and cellphones and the music that was listened to. It was self explanatory. It was the late 80's. Going into freshman year most girls in that era would have been fresh and innocent. I recall it with great clarity. In just four short years so many things change for the average girl, because to go from 14 to 17 or 18 is life changing. In no other time of our life does so little time pass while so much change and growth takes place. People complain that Lee does not grow. I think she did, but even at 17 we are babies, and I think it takes that very short period between the end of highschool and into the early twenties to garner the most change, and that is because highschool is such an insular experience. Once out in the real world, that growth can bloom. As for her relationship with Cross, I understood that too. In highschool it takes a rare girl to be so secure that they would'nt find themselves in such a situation as that. Being used sexually, giving instead of recieving, yes, I had a few of those kind of experiences. I certainly learned from them. Everything in this story was believable and on point. It certainly brought me back 25 years. It made me recall many of my own experiences. Certainly the distinction beteween popular and not so was dead on accurate. I could also identify with the distinction between the rich and LMC as I saw that first hand in one of the schools I attended. Really a thought provoking book and and a very interesting read. My daughter just graduated highschool and I had to remind her many times during her four years, it's just highschool, it's not real life. Now that I have read this, I remember all over again, and I understand that I was too glib.
- Reviewed by customer ID: AL66W0H5A29VQ
• Prep 10 November, 2008
In this coming of age story, an ordinary girl fights to succeed in the most extraordinary environment. Fourteen-year-old scholarship student Lee attempts to achieve greatness by enrolling in a prestigious boarding school. Besides the typical teenage girl drama (read boys and friends), she ends up battling mediocrity, loneliness, and class issues.
Lee is written with an authenticity that will make you cringe as she conjures memories of you as a high school student. She's written with the unmistakable blend of vulnerability, narcissism, and naiveté that defines the teenage girl. The novel is undeniably chick lit, and may not offer much to the male reader, but is a relatable and modern coming of age novel.
- Reviewed by customer ID: A19D3N662QS9WD
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