I have just recently finished reading a great book called “Be more chill” by Ned Vizzini. In this book, Vizzini takes a look at the American high school life of Jeremy Heere. Jeremy is a social failure, not having many friends, being humiliated on many occasions and plainly put, he’s just not cool. Jeremy always stares at a girl named Christine, wanting her, even though he knows that with his current social standing, he’d never get her. So Jeremy decides that he’d do anything it took to get her. So of course he jumped at the mention of something called a “squip”, which is supposed to be a kind of micro computer that you swallow. After swallowed, it’s supposed to make its way up your brain, and give you advice to help you achieve your goals. And what does Jeremy do after hearing this? He pays seven hundred dollars that he got from selling rare dolls he stole from his grandma, to get his hands on one.
While I was reading this book, I thought a lot about how the book was looking at social ranking. At first I interpreted Vizzinis writing to say that high social standing was something that must be achieved, in the case of Jeremy. But towards the end of the book, (SPOILER ALERT!!!) Jeremy throws away his “squip” because even though it was making him very popular, it was making him hated by his real and original best friends. So after finishing the book, I realized that Vizzini was actually telling us that friends are only friends if they really like you for who they are, and they’re not just your friends because you (“ehemm”*clearing throat sound inserted here) “f _ _ ked” the hottest girl in school (pardon my language please). So basically, just “stay with people like you, and don’t try to be someone you’re not” was the moral of this story.
All in all I definitely recommend this book to everyone looking for fun, relaxing read. Vizzini does a great job steering away from the stereotypes of an American teenager, and focusing on very real scenarios in a teen’s life.
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