Girls, Girls, Girls = Great, Great, Great

I’m not a teenager but lately I’ve been reading a lot of YA books. I noticed that there are two types of books: ones that have typical storylines but decent writing, and ones that try to do something different but the writing is boring. Stone Cold by Pete Hautman would be an example of the former. It’s a fairly short book (even by YA standards) about a boy who gets involved in the world of high-stakes poker gambling. The story is simple but the writing is clear, to the point, and involving, so I enjoyed it. Confess-O-Rama by Ron Koertge is an example of the latter. The kids in this book have actual conversations about art and issues and aren’t just about whether a cute boy is going to call. On the downside, it was deadly dull. It’s a rare book that manages to combine good writing with an imaginative story. And those two elements are what make Girls, Girls, Girls by Jonah Black stand out from the rest.

Girls, Girls, Girls is the first book of four (so far) and I am dying to read the rest of them. It’s the story of Jonah Black (I have no idea if the author’s name is a pen name or if he purposely used his own name for main character’s). He spent his sophomore and junior year in a school near his divorced father’s house in Pennsylvania and has now returned to his mother’s house in Florida for what he thinks is going to be his senior year. But because Jonah left the other school under less-than-ideal circumstances precipitated by some event which isn’t spelled out, he’s put back into junior year. He has to deal with being left behind, his young sister who’s a genius, who was put ahead, his girl friend, Posie, who he wants to date, but she already has a boyfriend, and other typical and not-so-typical problems.

Article Author: JDX

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