Book Review - 'She Drives Me Crazy' by Kelly Quindlen

2023 REREAD: It's cute, but wow is Scottie mean and nasty. The things she says, thinks and does are manipulative and malicious. Borderline abusive, even. Holy moly, does she never realise how much worse she is than Irene supposedly is? Than even Tally, her superficial and insecure ex, is? Scottie's blatant hypocrisy on a bigger scale isn't called out on; in fact, a lot of the vitriol she spews, and the deathly and narrow-minded judgemental thoughts she aims, at innocent people is forgotten about and never called out on. We are meant to like her, the underdog with serious issues and complexes who gets everything she wants at the end. And her taste in movies, in rom coms, is awful, I'm sorry. No wonder she's so dramatic, impulsive, petty, thoughtless and scheming. Therein the book contains contrived BS, too, typical of any rom com.

Also, Scottie, what does being gay have to do with missing out on being a girl? On knowing "Girl World" and "to be like any other girl" and "moving through both worlds"? (page 76) Are only straight girls supposed to know about putting on make-up and doing hair?

At least 'She Drives Me Crazy' is somewhat of a cute lesbian high school rom com. To be read in the winter season, for example. It is filled with an armada of diverse female characters. And basketball and cheerleading, things I am interested in but have never had the chance to play.

Alas, it is no longer for me. Maybe I am too old for some YA.

Final Score: 3/5





Original Review:



Simply put, 'She Drives Me Crazy' is a lesbian high school romance comedy drama, about the hate-to-love, fake-dating-to-real-dating relationship between Scottie Zajac, a redheaded basketball player, and Irene Abraham, an Indian American cheerleader and queen bee of the school. It pays homage to various eighties chick flicks, and is set in a small US town (called Grandma Earl - aww!) where apparently its most popular (and possibly only) movie theatre is one that only plays eighties chick flicks. It is chaotic and messy, with barely a strong enough plot to stretch out for a longish story, but that is the way of the rom com, right? A lot of the characters, notably the protagonist, say and do horrible and manipulative things, but that's part of the rom com formula too, so... homage? And that makes it ok?

But 'She Drives Me Crazy' is charming and funny, and self-aware enough to know about some of the problematic issues in existent eighties rom coms, like 'Say Anything...' and 'Sixteen Candles' (not nearly enough examples get the criticism they deserve, however). At least it knows it's cheesy and ridiculous, and it knows when to celebrate and incorporate traditional rom com tropes in the appropriate context. It isn't realistic, but it's fun and romantic - I'm not always a cynic!

The book spends a lot of time exploring the characters' feelings and emotional baggage and trauma, and it deftly captures the slow and painful healing process of breaking up with a first love, so it is not light on substance. It does criticise and subvert toxic relationships and behaviour.

Teaching teens to be their happy and authentic selves is extremely important. Huge props for that moral.

'She Drives Me Crazy' really is like reading a novel version of one of those types of eighties-nineties movies - it is ripe for the (olive branch) picking for a film adaptation. It has the nostalgia for and the zeitgeist of the classics, mixed with the modern LBGTQ and POC rep and wokeness, in its favour!

The characters are unforgettable, dynamic and often adorable, even when they do mean and/or stupid things, and when they're either cartoonishly evil or cartoonishly good (one character is actually named Honey-Belle). Some are exemplarily smarter than they are given credit for by their peers.

'She Drives Me Crazy' is zany yet oddly relatable, fast paced, cute, diverse (though it could have used some bisexual visibility as well as the acknowledgment of other sexualities existing than gay), addictive and OTT to the max. It can be breezed through in a full day's worth of reading. I recommend it for readers who like contemporary LBGTQ YA fiction such as 'The Henna Wars', 'Our Own Private Universe', and most Becky Albertalli titles.

The fact that I've always had a fondness for cheerleading (I never was one, sadly, and it is nowhere near being a thing in the UK as it is in the US) also endears me to it. I might buy an outfit and pom-poms for fun now! I agree with Irene and other decent people with brains that it is a legitimate sport, to be taken seriously. The confident, hardworking, energetic and brave cheerleaders do it more for themselves - and for the hype of the crowds - than anyone else. Fuck sexism.

One nitpick which isn't the book's fault: The protagonist Scottie's eye colour is said to be brown; yet on the awesome cover, which features her and her enemy-to-lover Irene starting to hold hands, she has green eyes, as is typical in redheads in fiction. Oops.

Final Score: 3.5/5