Review

Lee, a 14 year old from a lower middle class family, falls in love with the idea of attending a posh private boarding school and wins a scholarship to Ault, a prestigious New England prep school. Once there, she finds herself intimidated by the buildings, people and traditions, changing her from an outgoing, sassy, intellectually confident girl to someone timid, ignored and on the margins of school life. The first person narrative follows Lee through her time at Ault as she observes its upper class rituals and mores, learning, changing and making missteps.

*

This was another fascinating Sittenfeld immersion into an otherwise closed-off world. In fact, this was her first published novel, and it clearly set a pattern for her writing. It’s so emotionally true and keenly observed (Sittenfeld herself attended a similar school), and Lee is so humanly sensitive and fallible, that I found myself gripped, super-tense about what she might get wrong next. There was some crying (from me) and also a point where I stopped reading/listening because I was so worried about what might happen. Anyway.

Sittenfeld writes so well, in that very observant, very human literary style (reminds me of Edith Wharton), that it all seems completely real. What she mostly explores here is class, plus some intersections with race and gender. Lee is constantly getting little things wrong, but also having small wins. And, although a close and often humorous observer of what makes you acceptable at Ault (mostly money, but also just class, beauty, and seemingly careless talent), she doesn’t feel like she has anything to offer. She aims to survive, and yet part of her still longs to be noticed and valued. I felt like saying Just get out of there! But she feels like that would be a humiliating failure, a fate worse than any other, and so she persists.

A very human, very intimate coming of age novel.

420 pp., year 10 & up

> Click here for content information — spoilers, enter at own risk!

Some swearing; a small amount of crass sexualised misogyny; some teen sex scenes, some detail but it’s not at all salacious or glamourised; friendship issues; social exclusion; attempted suicide; class barriers/snobbery; small amounts of racism; lots of times when you’ll feel sad or embarrassed for the protagonist.

*

Sittenfeld, C. (2020). Prep (J. Marie, Narr.) [Audiobook]. Penguin Audio.

(Novel first published in 2005.) Bonus! Fun article in The Atlantic by Sittenfeld about the whole publishing/promoting side of writing Prep.

Images are used on this blog post under the “Fair dealing for criticism or review” provision of the Commonwealth Copyright Act, 1968.

This novel was brought to me by Libby — support your local library!