Prom -- a review by Hope Austin

Prom

by: Laurie Halse Anderson

***

Prom is about Ashley, a lower-middle-class girl in urban Philadelphia who touts herself as "normal". She has a job and a boyfriend who she plans on moving in with after grtaduation. She doesn't care about much: college, her sky-high stack of detentions, and least of all, prom. Ironically, that makes her abnormal, as every other girl in the senior class is absolutely crazy over prom, including Ashley's best friend, Nat. Nat is the leader of the prom committee. Ashley could not care less about prom, much to her mother's chagrin. Unfortunately for her, fate has other plans. The math teacher steals all of the prom money, leaving the school without a prom. Even though Ashley doesn't care about prom, she knows that the a great deal of girls and their families made massive sacrifices for that one night. At the urging of Nat, she begrudgingly joins the prom committee. Hey, it beats detention. Now Ashley must take on one of the biggest responisbilities of her life: planning an entire prom in about a week.

The other Laurie Halse Anderson books I have read are Speak, Catalyst, and Wintergirls. Imagine my surpise when I opened up this book and found a great deal of humor. It's good to know that an author who writes about such serious topics can be lighthearted at times, too. i could really have done without the comparisons to Cinderella, however. It's more of story with fairy-tale elements, but there's little comparison with any sort of Cinderella story. Otherwise, it's a good, fun story.