The Perks of Being a Wallflower

by DionysusPsyche

Stephen Chboski talks a lot about family. He illustrates their troubles, weaknesses, deep-seated issues although not in a psychoanalytical way. He speaks as the voice of a teenager--an empathetic, young man who tells and understands what others might miss.

Easy reads are out there. Well-written literature overflows from libraries. The author stays true to his character, and he also manages to make even the worst main and secondary characters somewhat lovable.

"Some people have it worse," he writes at the beginning, and it really sets the tone. He's a good, smart kid. The kind you hope you were. The kind you hope you have.

Charlie is incredibly close to two of his friends, although the general feeling is that Charlie is still removed from the present. He does and says things that others don't do and say. His friends love him for who he is, but that doesn't inhibit them from wanting to tune in him ways to make him more understanding of human nature. Yet, Charlie is what he is, and as a narrator, he does a great job, even if we don't feel like we get the full impression of what's going on.

As someone who had a preference and received superior grades in Language Arts and writing, I make notes as I go along. I used to only read books and occasionally take notes, but I began realizing that I had to read all my books twice. This was stressful, so eventually, I just kept notes within the novels (in pencil, calm down, and I owned them). I once loaned a book to a friend, and he said that the best parts were my notes. I think of that whenever I read and write in the margins.

The primary reason I keep notes, is because I like keeping track of quotables. There is a main part of this novel that I had to contrain myself to keep from underlining.

Cons
The book is melancholy, and downright depressing at times. It feels like Charlie is both much older and much younger than is the case, and I, as a reader, couldn't grasp as to why it felt this way until the end. He looks at things in a way I'm not sure high school kids do. this is one of the few times that Charlie feels different. This continued throughout the second half of the novel, though it did significantly improve from the middle portion.

Conclusion
I haven't seen the film, but I think The Perks of Being a Wallflower is a good book. It's interesting, and there are some twists you don't see coming. At times, the main character feels a little like Forrest Gump, but in a good way.