Ashley understands that even though she thinks the senior prom at her Philadelphia school is stupid it's a big deal to her close friends. Even so, Ashley is shocked to find herself the most likely candidate to save the prom after a troubled math teacher takes off with the funds. Many of Anderson's previous novels have been heart wrenching accounts of teen survivors, such as the date-rape victim in Speak (1999) and the Yellow Fever survivor in Fever 1793 (2000). Here, though Anderson's bright, witty narrator is a self-professed “ordinary kid,” whose problems, while intensely felt, are as common as a burger and fries. She's as ambivalent about her boyfriend, who is both sweet and undependable, as she is about her college prospects; her part-time job serving pizza in a rat costume is far from fulfilling; and her family, which she calls “no-extra-money-for-nothin’-poor,” mortifies her (her pregnant mother's belly “screams to the world” that her parents have sex), even as they offer love and support. In clipped chapters (some just a sentence long), Ashley tells her story in an authentic, sympathetic voice that combines gum-snapping, tell-it-like-it-is humor with honest questions about her future. The dramatic ending may be a bit over-the-top, but teens will love Ashley's clear view of high-school hypocrisies, dating and the fierce bonds of friendship. Copyright © 2005 American Library Association, all rights reserved.

 

Ashley thinks of herself as a normal kid: best friend next door, hot, but unreliable dropout boyfriend, parents a bit spacey, and a household barely hanging in there. She's not into the prom the way her best friend Natalia is, so when it nearly gets cancelled because a teacher has absconded with all the money, Ashley is not prepared for Nat's approach. Nat figures they can still have a prom, if they beg for stuff and get teachers to help and bribe the custodial staff and so on. Rather against her will, Ashley gets sucked into the lists in Nat's pink notebook. It delights her very pregnant mom; it makes dealing with all those detentions and uncompleted assignments even more of a chore; it focuses Nat's slightly addled Russian grandmother on dressmaking; and calls Ashley's hilarious aunts to the fore. Modern teen life just outside Philadelphia is vividly drawn in Ashley's first-person tale, and it's both screamingly funny and surprisingly tender. It's also full of sly throwaway references: oaths taken on a copy of Lord of the Rings instead of a Bible, Ash's dad singing Aerosmith, accounts that read, “he was all . . . I was all . . . then he was all.” Expect teen readers to be quoting aloud to each other, and giggling. Copyright © 2005 VNU eMedia, Inc., all rights reserved.

 

Kliatt - Starred Review

S* Ashley, age 18, can't wait to get out of her Philadelphia high school, and she certainly couldn't care less about the upcoming prom. All she cares about is her boyfriend, TJ, even if he is somewhat unreliable, and getting away from her crowded and wacky, if loving, home. But when her math teacher (aka "Miss Felony Crane") steals the prom money and Ashley's best friend, Nat, who is the prom organizer, is devastated, Ashley reluctantly comes to Nat's rescue and helps her figure out how they can hold the prom after all. In between her job serving pizza in a rat costume at EZ-CHEEZ-E, minding her younger brothers for her pregnant mother, and evading detention and the school's nasty vice principal, who has it in for her, Ashley manages to save the day, with humor and flair. Anderson, the award-winning author of Speak and other serious YA novels, has concocted a delightful confection here, full of laughs, warmth, and teenage dialog so true to life you might have heard it in the hall on the way to math class. Realistic, funny and touching, this is a treat that will be relished despite its somewhat predictable plot. For older teenage girls who have enjoyed the Princess Diaries books; there are a few profanities and references to sex here, making it more appropriate for mature readers. Paula Rohrlick, KLIATT S--Recommended for senior high school students. Copyright © 2005 Gale Group, Kliatt, all rights reserved.

 

 

PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER

    For a grown-up, Laurie Halse Anderson sure knows high school. Her first young adult novel, Speak, the story of a ninth-grade outcast, collected a vast number of awards, and was a finalist for the National Book Award.
Prom could do just as well. It's set in Anderson's adopted home of Philadelphia, in a neighborhood of hard-working people with no money to spare. Our homegrown hero is 18-year-old Ashley Hannigan, a self-proclaimed "normal" kid whose grades are nothing to write home about and whose family, though happy, is a little nuts.

 "Don't think it was quiet," she says, introducing readers to her house. On any given day she might hear her dad noisily dry-walling her long-time-in-coming bedroom in the basement, or her mom hollering at her to hang up the wash, or her little brothers, Shawn, Steven and Billy, playing "baseball" with hot dogs in the kitchen.

But Ashley has bigger problems than her overly boisterous family. She's trying to graduate from the kind of city high school where there are fistfights and metal detectors alongside students who win full-tuition scholarships to college. Getting out will be no small feat, what with the number of detention hours she has to put in by June. She's also toying with the idea of moving in with her boyfriend, TJ, but he's unreliable and a bit of a skeeze.

And then there's the prom. Ashley isn't a "prom-type person," but her best friend, Nat, has been dreaming about it for months. Natalia, who moved next door from Russia in third grade and has always "flirted with dorkdom," is one of several prom-committee members with problems at home and for whom prom night means a lot. "Prom was stupid for me," Ashley explains, "but not for them, and I wasn't such a butthead that I couldn't see the difference."

Anderson nails the high school experience. When their math teacher freaks out and gives them a pop quiz worth 40 percent of the grade, "Our mouths weren't moving, but our eyes were, blinking and flashing like billboards. Some people were saying, 'Bitch is wack,' and some people were saying, 'Forty percent?' and some people were saying, 'She's high.' "

She wasn't high, but she was about to get busted - for "misappropriating" the prom committee's funds. With no money and only a week to spare, the school cancels the dance. (Oops. Nat would scold me for that. "It's not a dance, it's the prom.")

To help her friend, Ashley works with the hated school administration to save something she didn't think she cared about, and Anderson finds humor and heartache in a situation that's pretty ordinary. But that's the key to the book's appeal: how normal it is, and real. In fact, Anderson has dedicated it "to all the 'normal' kids who... told me nobody ever writes about them."

Ashley's voice carries the story swiftly along on a current of truth-telling, funny pop-culture references, and true-to-life kidspeak. "Snoop Dogg looked skizzle-old, if you ask me," she offers, gazing at the TV.

It would be easy, with a character such as this, to give the story a cop-out, fairy-tale ending - girl gets her head on straight, girl gets out of the neighborhood - but Anderson makes her upbeat conclusion totally realistic. Ashley already has her head on straight, despite what her sadistic vice principal thinks, and the craziness of trying to save a prom in peril only serves to bolster her sense of self. After all, you can experience plenty of magic without leaving the neighborhood - something Philly folks just know. Reviewed by Katie Haegele. Copyright © Knight Ridder 2005, all rights reserved.

 

PUBLISHER'S WEEKLY

Ashley Hannigan has her future all planned out. She’ll graduate by the skin of her teeth (if she can serve the detentions she’s racked up and pay her overdue book fines), and then she’ll move into an apartment with her 19-year-old dropout boyfriend, T.J. The last thing on Ashley’s mind is Senior Prom... but that’s before a crisis hits Carceras High. After Miss Crane, the math teacher, embezzles all of the prom money, Ashley’s best friend, Nat (short for Natalia), begs Ashley to help the prom committee. Before Ashley understands the full impact of what’s happening, she finds herself leading a frenzied campaign to reorganize, finance and pull off a whole new prom in less than two weeks’ time. This energetic novel, narrated by Ashley, offers snappy commentary about high-school life, and some priceless scenes, one of which features Ashley (who had planned to skip the dance) being barraged by hand-me-down gowns from well-meaning relatives (none of which fit). Ashley shines brightly as the heroine who saves the prom, but memorable supporting characters—Ashley’s very pregnant mother (expecting her fifth child), an entourage of loud Irish aunts, and Natalia’s Russian grandmother, who has Alzheimer’s and a taste for canned ravioli—also add sparkle. Whether or not readers have been infected by prom fever themselves, they will be enraptured and amused by Ashley’s attitude-altering, life-changing commitment to a cause. Ages 12-up. Copyright © 2005 Reed Business Information, all rights reserved.

 

HORN BOOK REVIEW

Anderson's new novel weaves the singular spell of senior prom, captivating even jaded, street-smart, practical-minded Ashley Hannigan. Ashley, one of the "normal kids [who] weren't going to college, no matter what anybody said," is more concerned with finding an apartment with her boyfriend, TJ, than with the one night of romance that has all the other kids at her urban high school enthralled. The prom is suddenly threatened, however, when first a teacher steals all the funds and then Ashley's best friend (and head of the prom committee) breaks a leg; Ashley single-handedly saves the prom in between exhausting shifts at the EZ-CHEEZ-E restaurant. Despite her heroics, Ashley's unserved detentions and a malicious vice-principal conspire to keep her away on the big night, while her over-involved but loving family will do anything to get her there. The novel is set in a working-class Philadelphia neighborhood, but Ashley and her friends could be any American teens, less defined by their background than by their dreams. Ashley's poor academic performance is hard to reconcile with her intelligence and ambition, though Anderson offers a credible distraction in the charming (but unreliable) TJ. In allowing herself a little magic and fantasy, Ashley begins to see a different kind of happy ending to her life after graduation. Few adolescent girls will be able to resist Anderson's modern fairy tale. L.A. Copyright © 2005 The Horn Book, Inc., all rights reserved.

 

SCHOOL LIBRARY JOURNAL

Gr 8 Up-Ashley is (in her own words) normal--a senior from a lower-middle-class family, dating a high school dropout, and gearing up for graduation but with no plans for college. But when the new math teacher steals the prom money, Ashley--who swears she doesn't care--finds herself sucked into turning nothing into the best prom ever because it means the world to her best friend, Nat. This is a light, fast read, with “chapters” that range from one line to five pages and a narrative voice that is only a little smarter than it should be. Some secondary characters-Ashley's mother and Nat's grandmother-jump off the pages; unfortunately, the teens do not fare as well. Boyfriend TJ is a stereotypical tough boy, and Ash and Nat's other friends are there mostly as filler. But the first-person narration and the essentially personal nature of the story--Ashley finally comes into her own and proves herself successful at something other than garnering undeserved detentions-makes this a flaw that readers will overlook. In fact, the major flaw is that it's hard to believe Ashley is as bad a kid as she might have you believe. But teens are notorious for making petty misbehavior sound bigger and badder, so this could be read as further proof of just how normal she is. Those looking for another Speak (Farrar, 1999) may be disappointed, but this book will delight readers who want their realism tempered with fun.--Karyn N. Silverman, Elisabeth Irwin High School, New York City. Copyright © 2005 Reed Business Information, all rights reserved.

 

THE BULLETIN OF THE CENTER FOR CHILDREN'S BOOKS

Gr. 9-12 Ashley may be a senior, but unlike her best friend, Natalie, she's not particularly excited about the prom; it's touch and go whether she's even going to bother to attend enough classes to graduate, and she's looking forward to renting an apartment with her sexy though unreliable boyfriend, TJ. When a teacher absconds with the prom funds, Ashley's desire to support Natalie's prom dream leads her to pitch in with the effort to save the event; as the date draws closer (and Natalie suffers a broken bone that puts her out of planning commission), Ashley finds herself the main architect of a dance she doesn't even want to attend-or does she? By her terms a “normal kid” rather than a “good kid,” Ashley represents a point of view not often seen in literature for young people, that of the kid who's not expecting or desiring to go to college, who's satisfied with her working-class surroundings and future. Her cheerful pell-mell family and neighborhood is depicted with tenderness as well as humor, and the edge-of-Philly school, where “good fights” are those between kids of the same race (because they don't incur school lectures on tolerance), where corporate sponsorship proved a godsend, and where somebody's bound to be caught going down on her boyfriend in the middle of prom, are treated with matter-of-fact yet affectionate briskness. Anderson keeps the pace swift, dividing the narrative into numbered sections that are more brief scenes than chapters and emphasizing snappy dialogue that's imbued with the reality of longtime friendships. The Cinderella theme is handled with the lightest of touches (readers may not even initially pick up on the heroine's name); it's not really a story about Cinderella so much as a tale about the impulse to have one's moment of celebration, and readers will revel in Ashley's opportunity while dreaming of their own. DS