Not your average 'Prep'

At first glance, Curtis Sittenfeld's debut novel "Prep" perfectly fits in a popular culture obsessed with the lives of spoiled teenagers. The same currents that brought us "Mean Girls," "The OC," "One Tree Hill" and "The Simple Life" compel us to buy Sittenfeld's book while it's still hot on the New York Times bestseller list. Or perhaps we might wait until the summer, when we imagine it might make a nice read as we work on our tans on a beach in the Hamptons.

"Prep" is hyped as a novel about the luxuries afforded boarding school students and the fabulous lives these students lead, written by an insider who attended Groton more than a decade ago: a terrific way to sell a book, given that the secret unattainable habits of the privileged never cease to fascinate us. Notwithstanding the way "Prep" is marketed, with its obnoxious jacket design featuring a snazzy pink and green ribbon belt — which can be purchased via Sittenfeld's website — and lowercase periwinkle typeface, the novel is in fact a deeply self-conscious examination of naiveté, social class and, above all, pitfalls of love that reminds us much more of Dave Eggers than Paris Hilton.

The book is narrated by Lee Fiora, an observant, socially awkward scholarship student from South Bend, Indiana, who decides to attend the prestigious Massachusetts Ault School on a whim. At Ault, Lee must navigate the unfamiliar social maze created by her ambitious and mostly rich classmates. Lee's struggles with this social scene begin at the very first sentence of the book — "I think that everything, or at least part of everything that happened to me, started with the Roman architecture mix-up" — and culminate in a misguided love-affair with a wealthy basketball player from New York.

The plot spans her high school career, and is punctuated by poignant moments when the grownup Lee reflects on the significance of particular events that took place during her teenage years. It is in these passages that the themes of the novel take shape, and Sittenfeld renders them with noteworthy skill. Toward the end especially, these nostalgic meditations guide our assessment of Lee.

"I actually didn't — I don't — like talking about Ault... By my sophomore year at Michigan, if the subject arose, I would make only the most superficial remarks. These conversations were a lake I was riding across, and as long as we didn't dwell on the subject I could remain on the surface. But sometimes, if I talked for too long, I'd be yanked beneath, into cold and weedy water. Down there, I could not see or breathe, and it wasn't even the submersion that was the worst part, it was that I had to come up again. My present world was always, in its mildness, a little disappointing."

There are occasions, however, when the effectiveness of these passages is undercut by Lee's seemingly pathological insecurity and we often wonder whether the time and resources — if not money, which is covered by her scholarship — devoted to her education wouldn't be better spent on a good therapist. These insecurities affect every interaction she has with her classmates (except those between her and her sensitive and trustworthy roommate Martha) and often leads to uncomfortable situations: a betrayal of two friends early in the story and a foiled potential romance with Dave Bardo, a member of the school kitchen staff.

"I was afraid that Dave had chosen Chauncey's because he thought it was nice, when it wasn't nice. I was afraid he'd tell some jokey story, and I'd be worrying the whole time about whether it was actually going to be funny, and if it wasn't funny, would I be able to muster up appropriate laughter? I was afraid of how even though I would put on lotion before I left the dorm, I'd feel like the skin around my mouth was peeling."

Though Lee's insecurities are clearly essential in this coming-of-age novel, they are at times hard for the reader to digest and sometimes interfere with the pathos that is naturally evoked by Lee's status as a shy scholarship student from the Midwest in a milieu dominated by rich East Coast kids.

Her insecurities boil over when, during her senior year at Ault, Lee naively confides in a New York Times reporter who is writing about elite boarding schools. The resulting article cements Lee's reputation as an outcast in her final weeks of high school. The misery the New York Times piece causes is conflated by the less-than-cathartic end to her yearlong romance with Cross Sugarman, the basketball player from New York.

Lee had been infatuated with Cross since they were freshmen, and when Cross begins to make late night visits to her room during their senior year for sex, Lee is reluctant to make any demands lest she spoil her only means of interacting with him. "The difference between Cross and me was that he made choices, he exerted control, his agenda succeeded. Mine didn't." Lee never becomes Cross's girlfriend.

It would be disingenuous to call "Prep" a feminist or even post-feminist novel, but Sittenfeld certainly gives us an eloquent examination of adolescent gender roles. By dissecting Lee's affair with Cross in heartbreaking detail — and here the description of Lee's incessant self-consciousness serves the author well — Sittenfeld makes us understand the main character's perception of her own helplessness.

From Lee's first sexual encounter with Cross to their final confrontation alone in the school gym, Sittenfeld deftly renders a portrait of teenage angst: angst that seems ridiculously trivial in comparison to adult problems, but at the same time prepares us for and ultimately colors the way we tackle these problems.

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Curtis Sittenfeld sharpened her writing skills at the Iowa Writers' Workshop. Except for a few annoyingly long parenthetical passages, the prose is compact and lucid, which makes "Prep" an easy read. But don't let this fact mislead you: regardless of the silly cover and superficial hype, this is not your average beach novel.

Family ties

Curtis Sittenfeld's younger brother, P.G., is a member of the class of 2007 and a columnist for the Daily Princetonian. Though "Prep's" main character, Lee Fiora, has two brothers, P.G. emphasizes that neither of these characters are based on him.

"While I was reading the book I was waiting for the runty little brother, but it never came out. The book is definitely a work of fiction," P.G. said.

He describes Curtis as an incredibly thoughtful sister who had a big impact on his life despite their nine-year age difference. When he was a child, "Curtis once sat me down and read me Roald Dahl's 'The Wonderful Life of Henry Sugar,'" he said. P.G. tells the Prince that Curtis recently signed a contract with Random House for two more books and sold the movie rights to Prep to Paramount.

"I told her that if the movie gets made I want to be in it," (and hopefully playing opposite a Lindsay Lohan type)," P.G. said.

Though he says that his sister has been a role model for him, when it comes to writing, P.G. is not yet sure if he wants to write professionally. So far P.G. has made the most of his time here at Princeton by serving as class president his freshman year, trying out for crew and Disiac ("strokes of the pen are much easier for me than dance moves"), being a member of the press club and writing for PAW and the Prince.

He plans to major in English and pursue certificates in Teacher Preparation and American Studies. P.G. explains that despite her success, "Curtis is so humble. The rest of the family has been happier about the book's success than she has been herself. I'm just so happy for her."