okay, so i have a bookly confession to make (and also a moviely one) that i feel it is finally time to come to terms with. a few years ago i had heard enough reviews about how awesomely amazing the perks of being a wallflower was that i finally decided to just read it already. (most of the time i am very bad at reading recommended books and books that are known to be awesome. it takes me forever.) so i get the book and curl up with it, preparing for my mind to be blown. i was ready to laugh and cry and finally know the meaning of life. (those seemed to be the most common reactions to the book.) i started it and thought, meh. i got halfway through and thought, meh. i turned the last page and thought, okay i must be missing something here.
it wasn't a bad book, though i kind of wish it was. (at least bad books can be enjoyed for their sheer awfulness and incite some kind of strong reaction in me.) this book was just there. maybe, being in my first year or so of college, i was just too old to enjoy it. maybe there was the whole emperor's new clothes thing going on and i needed to be the little kid to point out that the guy was naked. maybe it was that we kept being told that charlie was some super english genius and yet we were reading his letters and i saw none of that genius in them. or maybe it just went right over my head. anything is possible. the point is, whenever someone would quote "and in that moment, we were infinite" and say it gave them chills, or refer to the book as the greatest thing they ever read and the book that made them who they are, i kind of wanted to demand they tell me what was so great about it and give them a list of actually great novels that they should read instead.
and then the movie came out and i was like okay cool. it's been a few years since i read the book, the cast is awesome, maybe i'll finally understand the hype for this thing. but i came out of the theater thinking that i got it more in book form, and that's saying something. as people were going on and on about how amazing the movie was, i had to wonder if we were watching the same thing. the most i got out of the movie was that emma watson, though she had a flew slip ups, did a pretty good american accent and that the actors can, in fact, act. as for the story... well that went straight over my head. again.
maybe i'm a book snob, (though considering some of the trash that i read and enjoy i highly doubt that.) or maybe i'm just stupid. but i really, really do not see what is so great about this book. there have been books that i didn't like but could see why other people thought they were the epitome of awesomeness. this is not one of those books. if you read and liked the perks of being a wallflower, please explain this to me. i kind of need to understand this.
on a completely random note, i had a pina colada yogurt for breakfast this morning and it just might have been the greatest most delicious thing i have ever eaten ever.
*Things That I Don't Understand - Coldplay
first i can't get over the yogurt flavor. kill me please. i can only eat grapes in light n fit strawberry yogurt or add honey to the vanilla light n fit, but otherwise yogurt gives me heebie-jeebies.
ReplyDeletealso, i never read the book, but i did watch the movie, mainly for emma watson. i liked it, actually. i came in expecting something completely different from the whole abuse thing, so the movie did surprise me.
it has to be low fat or fat free yogurt for me and i have to stir it till its perfectly smooth and it can't have any water on the top, but other than that i eat whatever yogurt, and this one tasted amazing.
ReplyDeletei liked the movie, but i didn't think it was one of those life changing ones. it was one that i would watch again for the actors not the story. i think i was expecting too much from it, too.
i saw the movie first then read the book. perhaps you need to be younger to have it "change" you or whatever. but i felt too old for it
ReplyDeletei think that's probably it. i felt old for it, too.
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