The Miseducation of Cameron Post by EM Danforth, review

I read it in one sitting. It's no secret how much I love YA fiction...I LOVE YA FICTION.

I especially love YA fiction that reveals how complex and complicated growing up can be.  Maybe because I'm still growing up and finding my own way too.

The Miseducation of Cameron Post represents everything I love about YA fiction.  It's real.  It's gritty.  I empathize with Cam, even if she's not always likable.  The whole way though, I'm cheering her on...and I wish she was my friend.

The first half of TMCP describes Cameron's life growing up in Miles City, Montana after the death of her parents.   Now, raised by her grandma and uber born again Aunt Ruth, Cameron has to navigate teenhood. Growing up in a semi-rural/suburban area, this part of the book sounded very familiar.  Lots of exploring places we need not explore, closerthanclose friendships, and in this case, sexual experimentation and pot smoking.  What I like about this half is that Cameron seems so...real, so much like kids I went to school with.  Nothing in the book seems forced, including Cameron's sexuality- it's all very fluid and complex.

The second half of the story focuses follows Cameron through a "pray the gay away" camp.  I found this part of the story to be...well, horrifying and uncomfortable.  Not because of the writing, of course, but because it scarily accurately reflected some beliefs....

This book is wonderful.  The characters are complicated and well-written, accurately revealing how complex teen life can be.  Danforth's beautiful writing style places me right there, on the Montana plains.  I feel Cameron's struggle, her confusion, her defiance and her emptiness and betrayal. The Miseducation of Cameron Post, at 400+ pages, is a well-worth it summer read.

I really wish I knew Cameron Post in real life.

...

i really feel like ive hit rock bottom.

dc was supposed to be a whole new start- new career, new opportunities, new life.  .  instead, in the face of neverending economic recession, i've decided to take my seven years of education and start my own business.  except even that is moving slow as molasses.  there are too many people to count on, and when one mysteriously stops, the whole process screeches to a halt.  i miss when i literally controlled every aspect of my work.  i don't miss the stress of grad school or thesis, but i miss my work ethic.  i miss my drive.  i miss not having to count on any single person.  that was nice.

i find myself longing for my old life, a life i can't have back. i lived with my closest friends and my amazing boyfriend.  we all spent a lot of time together.  they drove me nuts and i returned the favor.  but i loved them.  id like to believe everything was rosy and perfect there, but it wasn't.  outside of the safety of our old yellow house, i was still an outsider.  i think maybe...three people came to my going away dinner.  i invited close to 50 local people.  but that mattered less because i had my house.

here i have nothing.  i have a menial low low paying job.  i'm trying to be ok with this.  i like the idea of being able to travel off and on over the next year .  woo, indepedent contractor!  i don't like that i am working like 15 days in a row...but hey MONEY IS MONEY RIGHT.  besides, once this girl comes back from chicago, i give her back her route and i have...nothing again.

i dont even know where i was going with this.

sorry.