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A review by ablotial
How I Paid for College: A Novel of Sex, Theft, Friendship & Musical Theater by Marc Acito
4.0
After the first two pages, I thought I would hate this book. The style is extremely casual and the topics kind of crude. But I'm glad I kept going, in the end. I liked this book a lot more than "The Catcher in the Rye", to which this book has many similarities (and the book itself points this out and mentions the Salinger book multiple times).
It's a coming of age story starring a bisexual teenage boy in his final year of high school. His father refuses to pay for him to go to Julliard for acting school, preferring his son to study business. While simultaneously holding down acting careers and multiple sexual relationships, the boy and his friends scam and plot their way into some money for him to attend college, with some very unintended consequences. Nothing works out the way they intended, but somehow, everything ends satisfactorily.
Yes, it's crude. Yes, it's sexual, and homosexual! But it's interesting, and funny, and a pretty fast read (one 3 hour flight plus an hour or so in a hotel room). My only thought was that the ending, about it being his homework assignment, was sort of tacked on. I didn't get that feeling from the actual contents of the book, though it is told in first person.
If I could give it a 3 and a half, I would. But if I have to choose, I guess I pick 4 instead of 3 since it did entertain me quite well.
It's a coming of age story starring a bisexual teenage boy in his final year of high school. His father refuses to pay for him to go to Julliard for acting school, preferring his son to study business. While simultaneously holding down acting careers and multiple sexual relationships, the boy and his friends scam and plot their way into some money for him to attend college, with some very unintended consequences. Nothing works out the way they intended, but somehow, everything ends satisfactorily.
Yes, it's crude. Yes, it's sexual, and homosexual! But it's interesting, and funny, and a pretty fast read (one 3 hour flight plus an hour or so in a hotel room). My only thought was that the ending, about it being his homework assignment, was sort of tacked on. I didn't get that feeling from the actual contents of the book, though it is told in first person.
If I could give it a 3 and a half, I would. But if I have to choose, I guess I pick 4 instead of 3 since it did entertain me quite well.