"Imperfect Birds," the newest novel from Anne Lamott, is, I'm sorry to say, a mom book. We all know the kind suited to a book club full of moms looking for some juicy source material to start a discussion about adolescent secrecy and substance abuse. While it's a fine read for moms, I wouldn't recommend it to most college students.
What is a mom book, exactly? They're not necessarily bad books in fact, often they can be quite good (see: "Divine Secrets of the Ya-Ya Sisterhood"). But regardless of the quality of the writing, mom books share a few defining characteristics. They have those instantly recognizable pastel covers that grace the front tables at major bookstores. They sell suspiciously well. Moms like to talk about them. And unfortunately, the ones about adolescence like "Imperfect Birds" are rather out of touch with what adolescence truly feels like.
"Imperfect Birds" is a finely written novel that chronicles the demise of Rosie, a 17-year-old straight-A student who, unbeknownst to her cool, modern parents, enjoys a few drugs on the side. The tension throughout the whole novel rests on the discrepancy between Rosie's secret life and her exterior, "good kid" image. At first, her parents are mostly oblivious to her drug use (they think she just drinks infrequently and dabbles with pot). Then, as the novel progresses, they begin to see what is truly going on and those realizations constitute the bulk of the story.
The novel keeps your attention, but by no means is it incredibly engrossing. Lamott is a decent and mostly unremarkable writer. The characters were believable, but not memorable. The whole novel felt like a sort of warning sign to parents of seemingly good kids.
Lamott's bias as a parent is evident throughout the book, especially when the author attempts to get inside her adolescent protagonist's mind. Most of the time, the details about Rosie's life weren't terribly off base, but any teenager could tell that Lamott doesn't really remember what adolescence was like or at the very least that she can't figure out how to explain it in words. At one point, Rosie says, "Why do Alice and Jody have boyfriends and not me? What's wrong with me?" Sure, plenty of teenage girls have this thought, but I wanted to see more originality and wit in Rosie's character.
At other times, the prose was simply archaic. At one point, Rosie complains about a "gnarly project on Reconstruction due for AP History." Does anyone say gnarly anymore? I don't know of anyone except for my ski bum friends in Colorado, and they sure wouldn't use it to describe any type of schoolwork.
"Imperfect Birds" has received a lot of hype probably because of Lamott's past success, and probably because publishers know this will sell well (there are a lot of moms out there). Personally, I think the hype should go to a more deserving novel with more insight, originality and spunk.
