Rating: 4 out of 5 Stars ****
Plot:
Popular: Vintage Wisdom for a Modern Geek, follows the journey of thirteen year old Maya as she goes from a 'social outcast' to 'popular'. That is the very oversimplified plot though. Maya has always been a social outcast and one day she comes across a 1950's guide to being popular and decides she will follow a different chapter each month and experiment to whether the advice given in the 1950s is still fitting today. From hair and make-up to confidence, Maya takes each piece of advice and tries to apply it to her life in the 21st Century. Through this she discovers what it really means to be 'popular'.
Review:
Okay, so I have mixed feelings on this book, I would give a 3.5/4 stars because of this. Let's start of on a negative note so I can end positively. I think one of the things that I didn't like about the book, which I have found many people have said on GoodReads, is that it is too 'nice'. By that I mean at times it was too sickly-sweet. I found that despite being perceived as not popular and bullied a little, Maya already has quite a happy life. However, that being said she does learn a lot through the process... ( we will come back to that). One of my bigger issues was that someone so young was dieting and worried about body image, even though the end doesn't promote this, the book still goes through chapters and chapters highlighting how Maya changes herself to make herself popular. The end doesn't follow this message, but Maya has still taken on advice to change herself and image, as to become more popular. Maya's age can be seen throughout her writing sometimes, however most of the time she writes really well. I think with age and practice though, she will become a better writer. There may be a few other small points that I wasn't happy with at the time of reading, but I want to go on to the positives for now.
So first of, I want to say Maya must have been really brave to experiment with some of the ideas in this book, from wearing pantaloons to talking to people she has never talked to before. Maya jumps completely outside her comfort zone and encourages you to do so to. However, even though Maya does encourage the reader, I will probably not do much moving outside my comfort zone, maybe because I am lot older than the Maya, but I feel sometimes the book suggests you have to force yourself to impress others. I feel safer in my private cocoon. Anyway, despite the issues with some of the chapters, the end picked up for me... and although I wanted to shake Maya throughout the book and tell her that popularity does not matter, in the end she realises so.
One part I would have liked to know more about was the area she lived in, I don't know anything about the kind of life people live in that area apart from what Maya tells me and from Drills due to armed robberies across the street from their school and gangs, I want to know more about the area.
The end of the book is what really made the book for me... so SPOILER ALERTS FROM HERE ON....
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The last few chapters were what made the book, for me, able to reach 4 stars. Now this was because the body image ideal was thrown away and it was more about confidence and being yourself. When Maya does a week where she sits with each different table of people at her school, from 'social outcasts' to 'Football Fanatics', I loved the fact she was breaking the status quo. But doing so she wasn't just doing something to meet new people, but doing something that made a statement to the people around her. People can mingle, you don't have to be in one particular group to talk to a particular type of people. At my school, we did have 'popular' people, but the groups weren't like how American High School is presented on TV or in books. We just had friendship groups in the end, and they weren't exclusive either. But at Maya's school this 'ideal' stood and she was able to break it. Her actions didn't just change herself, but the people around her. I also love the fact that she interviews people on what being popular is and whether they are popular. I would have loved more of this interview technique throughout the book, a bit like Candance Bushnell's Sex and The City , journalist idea. I would have liked to know what other people thought about clothes, hair, skin etc...
I wanted to also know more about her family as well, I felt that although the story was about Maya's journey that her family had some interesting characters and there is potential for more stories surrounding them?
Below I will insert some quotations I really loved and why :) :
This quote I really love because it is true. When tragedy strikes, the barriers disappear between groups of people. As a human response we respond to another persons pain and we can see this through just watching films and reading books. However, I would also like to add that big celebrations also break down boundaries, a happy event can allow everyone to express themselves. But we are all human is what Maya is really saying.
This one may be a little difficult to see, but is says 'Why is everyone so scared of one another?'. This I feel links a lot to the previous quotation. I like this one, because if you walk around, you find that people try not to talk or make eye contact with one another. ( I should know, I do this too) Especially in the UK and in big cities. Maya asks an important question. Why are we scared? or more importantly why am I scared?
This one is also not very clear, late night reading, equals late night quotation photographs. This one I found resonated a lot to me. I am the latter in the equation though.
Overall, I really enjoyed this book, I feel it aimed a lot younger than me and I feel like some of the book was hard to relate to. However, the messages that Maya leaves at the end is easily relatable to teenagers. I loved some of the writing style, and some of the thoughts Maya puts across, and feel that she is an author to look out for in the future. I feel this books will be beneficial because of the overall message for teenagers, however I hope they don't find themselves dieting and changing their look just to be come 'popular'. I feel without the book Maya would have experimented with some of the things in the book anyway and found her own voice and style as part of growing up. But I guess it is always helpful to have a guiding voice a long the way through Betty, which know Maya can provide to others.
Recommend to: teenagers who believe the concept of popularity needs to change and want to find out what popularity really means.
Popularity is just a social concept: the idea that certain people are seen as better for having more friends or being a certain way. Remember, it's not how many friends you have, it's the type of friends you have.
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