The Perks of Being a Wallflower

Of course I loved the book. It's so much more than "young-adult combing-of-age". For me, it was deeply moving, an often gripping story, particularly at the end, and it opened a window not just into teenagers, but into life at all stages -- this while being extremely well-written and without calling attention to its well-written-ness. What I found most striking, was showing life through a different kind of mind, what's sometimes called Asperger's Syndrome or High-Functioning Autism. AS/HFA isn't a disease, but an important difference, important to us all. What makes AS/HFA an important difference is its talents, particularly its special "perceptiveness", though not "perceptiveness" in the usual sense. More as a deep meaning to what Robert Burns wrote, "And would some power, the Gods give us, To see ourselves as others see us!" (Know this book deals directly with many painful topics including abuse, suicide and violent bullying. It's not for "more sensitive" readers.) Reading several reviews, I'm not surprised that some reviewers found the lead character, Charlie, "too sweet" and "improbable". In this, understandably, they miss Charlie's "diffferent" mind and more, his "different" way of being. I'm a psychotherapist, specializing for several decades in people for whom therapy has failed, often people, like Charlie, who've been hospitalized. And a dozen years ago, I discovered that maybe a quarter of my clients were in the autism spectrum, almost always AS/HFA -- often highly intelligent and able to relate to the neurotypically-structured social world, though relating "differently" and needing much more conscious struggling with the basics. After working several years with AS/HFA, I found these people had remarkable powers, and the usual "unable to relate or care" descritpion of autism just wasn't true in the ordinary sense. Most were neither uninterested nor uncaring -- in fact, quite the opposite. They desperately wanted to relate and, in some ways, they were over-caring, extremely sensitive to others. They related differently, not only to others, but to themselves and their world and, in particular, to language. Often not badly, but just very differently. Writing in first person gives the author no place to hide. You MUST have an extremely interesting character, and you MUST know that character with ruthless clarity. Chbosky does, and he does so well that I suspect he may have a touch of autism himself. Or at least it runs in his family. Disclosure: after several years working with AS/HFA children, teens and adults, I noticed that I was unusually drawn to them; I could almost use that diagnostically. With that awareness, I figured out that autism runs in my family. And with that, the disease faded away and the differences began to shine through. Let me note a few points from "The Perks" to illustrate. Charlie's speech, thinking and relating, at first blush, seems to be almost child-like, more charcteristic of six years old than sixteen. He has an astonishing honesty, a naive not-understanding, and his use of words frequently has that unintended poetic feel of children. But look more carefully: Yes, there are situations he doesn't get in ways shocking for a middle-teen. But as he thinks about them and questions them, he often goes right to the heart-of-the-matter, and a heart-of-the-matter that's usually missed or forgotten by those of us, especially adults, who "just get it" and go on. Let me give an extended quote from the book's end: "Later, [my friends, Sam and Patrick,] came by in Sam's pickup truck. And we went to the Big Boy just like we always did. Sam told us about her life at school, which sounded very exciting. And I told her about my life in the hospital, which didn't. And Patrick made jokes to keep everyone honest. After we left, we got in Sam's pickup truck, and just like Sam promised, we drove to the tunnel. About half a mile from the tunnel, Sam stopped the car, and I climbed in back. Patrick played the radio really loud so I could hear it, and as we were approaching the tunnel, I listened to the music and thought about all the things that people have said to me over the past year. I thought about Bill telling me I was special. And my sister saying she loved me. And my mom, too. And even my dad and brother when I was in the hospital. I thought about Patrick calling me his friend. And I thought about Sam telling me to do things. To really be there. And I just thought how great it was to have friends and a family...." "But mostly, I was crying because I was suddenly very aware of the fact that it was me standing up in that tunnel with the wind over my face. Not caring if I saw downtown. Not even thinking about it. Because I was standing in the tunnel. And I was really there. And that was enough to make me feel infinite." Starting out, it seems almost primitively black-&-white, until "And Patrick made jokes to keep everyone honest." In the context of all that literal-ness, it's startling. Charlie doesn't just note that "Patrick is telling jokes". Humor is often a struggle for AS/HFA, and so they need to work at understanding it. Through his work, Charlie is seeing not only Patrick's style of humor, but its function. Since AS/HFA often doesn't instinctively grasp "what" to do, they approach others and their world more basically through "why it's done" and "what it means". Because Charlie struggles to see the function of so much, he remains very much in touch with a stripped-down sense of that function's truth. Again, "And Patrick made jokes to keep everyone honest." Then Charlie's "telling" returns to seemingly smple description. But read again: the description is less "simple" than "primary". And in many ways, this is the importance for us in AS/HFA relating. Attention to detail, of what simply "is", is consciously, clearly combined with an almost-primary way of relating to themselves, to others, to their world, as well as a primary relating to language. And when we see ourselves, our world, our lives through Charlie's AS/HFA "primary" lens, we not only see afresh. We see what is "primary", what goes to the heart-of-the-matter, what is the stripped down function, and so what is truly important. Not preachy, but very experiential -- "truly important" very much as-lived. And Charlie winds up poetically pointing to primary experiences, connections and always-available potentials within and around us all: "And that was enough to make me feel infinite". And he got there through self and love and family and friends. Frankly, as a therapist who works most-of-all with severe trauma -- war PTSD, attachment disorders, sexual abuse, and deep grievings -- that's a short list, in those two paragraphs, of what gets lost in trauma and of what it takes to heal. OK, I'm probably probing more than interests most potential readers. As you can see in other reviews, there are many levels to enjoy in this book. If you like, though, let yourself be touched by Charlie's "primary" description-plus-function. You may find it not only intriguging and moving, but healing. And who of us can't use a touch of healing now-and-then? P.S. I read this on Kindle and, even on my laptop, I found it an easy read. It was particularly helpful because, now over 60 years old, I can boost up the print size, making reading more relaxing.

Today, friends, I must start with a confession: I tried to read The Perks of Being a Wallflower during high school and immediately loathed and DNFed it. As such, I’ve not tried again until 2014, at least ten years after my first attempt. I also went for a format change, because I had a vague memory of the writing being a problem, and switching formats can help with that. It’s funny, because I completely understand why my teen self loathed this book, but I can also appreciate it now and admire what it’s doing on top of enjoying the story. The writing in The Perks of Being a Wallflower probably would have been a struggle for me still, at least at the beginning. There’s a sort of Catcher in the Rye-ness to the book, but, unlike Catcher, there’s personal growth throughout the book. Perks is a full year in Charlie’s life, his freshman year of high school, and he learns a lot during that year. He grows emotionally and intellectually. For this reason, I’d say you should push through, even if you don’t like Charlie or his narration at the outset. In case you do struggle, I highly recommend this audio version narrated by Noah Galvin. Perks is one of those books written in the way that someone talks, and so it lends itself really well to the audio format. Plus, Galvin sounds like he could be 15, which is actually a really difficult thing to find in YA audiobooks. He reads with great emotion too. This was really a perfect book for the audio format. Charlie’s a really great and unique character, something which I couldn’t appreciate back when I tried to read it as a teen. At the time, I read a lot of romance, classics, and various adult fiction. YA wasn’t my thing, and I wasn’t used to reading about teen characters. Plus, Charlie’s a very unusual boy. He’s highly emotional and cries a lot, something I’ve never really done. I didn’t get him back then. Now, though, I’m so glad to see a book about a boy who cries, because our culture teaches guys to repress their feelings, and repression is not healthy. The novel’s all about learning to accept and understand yourself. There were two things I didn’t like about Perks. The first is all the drug use and smoking. Realistic, sure, but also it made me uncomfortable that smoking wasn’t shown in an unflattering light. This is one of the things that I just cannot abide personally. Then there’s Sam. She’s a full-blown Manic Pixie Dream Girl, which is a term I really don’t use often. She’s got very little personality, aside from being fascinating, gorgeous, mysterious, and sexy. I’m pretty positive John Green read this book and was greatly influenced by it. Sam’s character just isn’t interesting to me, and whenever he went on and on about her, I was rolling my eyes. The ending of The Perks of Being a Wallflower threw me for a bit of a loop. It was completely perfect and well-established by the text and at times I even wondered if something like that was coming. Still, the epilogue knocked my feet out from under me. I just am not used to epilogues containing any actual plot. Well, this one does and that plot packs a brutal punch. If you’re the sort of person who cries at books often, the epilogue should be called Sob City. It’s dark and painful, but also inspiring somehow, which is pretty damn impressive. It also brings the journey of the rest of the novel into stark relief. I’m sort of at a loss for what to say about this one without spoilers, so I guess I’ll just exhort you to give this book more of a chance than teen Christina did. This is a YA classic for a reason.

Dear Friend, I literally just finished reading this book, and felt compelled to write a review. Not because I'm some sort of intellectual who just loves to hear myself and show people how smart I am, or how well (or not well) I write. I am not even attempting to persuade anyone to purchase this book. I am writing this because I feel inspired. Mainly I feel inspired because at times I feel that the central character and I share many of the same attributes. Mainly the ability to watch and absorb, but not actively participate. Like Charlie, I am participating by writing this review because believe it or not, something as small as writing a simple review on Amazon can make a "wallflower" feel like a participant and not just a quiet observer. This is something I have taken from this book. This is not so much me explaining my inner battle, not like being a compulsive liar, or a maniac depressive or something that can actually be considered a battle from within that can have life changing results. Simply, this is a characteristic that I am aware of that I would like to change to a certain extent "because it's okay to feel things. And be who we are about them", and expressing oneself is the best way to feel things, even in the smallest ways. Kurt Vonnegut once said "to practice any art, no matter how well or badly is a way to make your soul grow". I have never written a review, the last time Ive done anything similar to this was probably a million years ago when I had to do my last book report ever. Bare with me, I'm sure my thoughts and opinions will become a jumbled up mess at some point. But I must remind myself that this is NOT about perfection. So here goes nothing........... "The Perks of Being a Wallflower" is a story of a young man named "Charlie", he makes it known he rather be anonymous to his audience so throughout the book he uses this particular fake name for his anonymity reasons. His audience is a person he has never actually meet, but knows through other people and feels comfortable enough to write letters to (you get the feeling very quickly that Charlie does not have many outlets for his feelings, so anything seems acceptable and helpful). These letters contain his days, his thought, his opinions, and mainly his raw feelings. Charlie is pleasant boy with a gentle presence and a sensitive soul. He is a bit odd in his feelings and has some troubles, troubles that throughout the book are a bit hard to pin point. You soon learn that he has lost two very important people in his life and figure that he has had a really hard time dealing with these losses. He is a lonely young man getting ready to start his freshman year of high school. He loves his family but has a disconnect from them mainly because of his quiet nature and sensitivity, which no one understands, but his mother is the most patient with him. He doesn't have many friends and would be considered a loner until Sam and Patrick come along. With them comes a light that is shone into charlies gloomy world that gives him a new found hope and happiness. He feels less alone now that he has found two people who have genuinely taken an interest in him. Sam and Patrick are older, but when getting to know Charlie while reading this book you start to see that him being friends with older people is actually better for Charlie, as opposed to being friends with kids his own age. Because of Charlies over-sensitivity I believe it could've only been tolerated by people with a certain amount of maturity. They see Charlie as not just a sweet kid, but a person with a lot to contribute; whether he believes this quality about himself or not. Sam and Patrick are both very interesting people, both seniors and consider themselves to be very cultured and individualistic. Charlie takes notice of this and gravitates towards them and there circle of friends very quickly because they are so interesting, fun, honest, and forgiving. Throughout this book through the letters Charlie sends his anonymous reader, you feel Charlies love for everyone in his life including his siblings, parents, his teacher who takes a special interest in Charlie, his deceased aunt, and mostly his friends Sam and Patrick. Through the book you feel Charlies highs and his lows, but you also feel the dark cloud that seems to never be too far from Charlie. This sadness and guilt haunts Charlie regularly and just when it seems his has shaken it, it appears over his head gloomier and sadder than ever. You come to love Charlie very quickly when reading this book, he reminds us what it meant to be a timid teenager with a vulnerability and sensitivity that at times is indescribable. You also see how fiercely loyal Charlie is. When the tables turn and his friends start having hard times, Charlies love and devotion to his friends never changes, even when they "turn" on him, it never changes. Through his experiences you become invested in Charlie because there is a longing that you hope he gets better, with a mixer of wanting to protect him from the harshness of the world. When the book nears the end there are some revelations that are like a light switch coming on in a scarily dark room. The pieces that were missing from the puzzle are found, and with comes a maturity and acceptance that Charlie did not poses during the beginning of the book. Of course I highly recommend this book to anyone interested in reading a book that is beautifully simplistic. But I mainly recommend this book to anyone who is or once was a wallflower. I recommend this book to the sensitive souls that drift around in the cruel and hard world. I recommend this book to anyone who rather take a hug than throw a punch. I recommend this book to the high schooler feeling lost and alone. I recommend this book to anyone who loved the 90's as much as I did!!!! I also recommend reading this book with "The Smiths" music on repeat. Thanks for taking the time to read. Hopefully my reviews will get better as time goes on. Cheers! Teresa

In the story, Perks of Being a Wallflower by Steven Chbosky published in 1999 by MTV Books, the main character Charlie lives life in highschool. In the beginning of the story, he was considered a loser. He had one friend until he died and then he was alone. When he started 9th grade, he met some new friends. Sam and Patrick. Charlie though that Sam was beautiful and that he loved her even though she was dating an older guy named Craig. Patrick had an on and off relationship with the quarterback of the football team. Sam and Patrick would skip classes with their friends and go smoke. Charlie would stand with them and talk and eventually he started smoking. Charlie met new friends when he went to parties. At these parties, people would smoke and drink and do drugs. Charlie did too. One girl asked him to a dance and he said yes. It was Mary Elizabeth. They went to the dance and then they started dating. They would hang out a lot and buy each other gifts. Throughout the story, charlie talks about his aunt Helen and how she would let them watch tv late at night. When his birthday comes around, he is very sad because his birthday is the day that she died and he missed her. He gets very depressed and drives to her grave and cries there. He missed her a lot because she was a nice loving person but she was gone. Charlie also has a sister and an older brother. His brother is off in college playing football. His sister is in highschool too. She had a boyfriend in the beginning of the book and Charlie saw him hit her. And she didn't do anything. Charlie wasn't allowed to tell his parents but he did end up telling a teacher who called their parents. She has other boyfriends that Charlie sees and talks about. The real end to this story is when Charlie's sister, and Patrick and Sam graduate and go off to college. I loved this book. It's about this weird kid in high school and its very funny. It is also very relatable. Many kids could connect to this, whether its about friendships or romantic relationships or family problems. Almost any problem that a teenager could have is in this book. And Charlie has those problems but he lived through it. This book may however not be appropriate for younger kids. It is not difficult to read, but there are some inappropriate things in the book. The book is set up as letters to an unknown person (the reader) and from Charlie. This is a rather unusual way of writing a story but this book has no plot. Nothing happens. There is no storyline. Charlie is just living his life and explaining it in these letters. There is also no known reason why he writes to this person. The book is easy to follow and fun to read. Overall, I really enjoyed this book and I think many people would love reading it. It's interesting and it's as if a teen boy actually wrote it.

To be clear, I actually saw the film before I read the book, but I'll discuss the novel first as its the original. Perks is a teen coming of age novel set in 1991. This is a compulsively readable book. Casually, before picking at the flaws, this is the kind of book you read in one sitting. Every time I run across something this engaging, I feel an intense relief -- pleasure really -- because so much of what I read is a bit of a chore. Probably just me being jaded. So while I'm going harass Chbosky on a few fronts, any criticism should be framed in context: This is a novel that really sucks you in and holds you. As to voice. Technically, the book is epistolary. The protagonist, Charlie, writes letters to some imaginary friend. It's a gimmick that neither adds or subtracts. This is basically a first narrative with a slightly confused back and forth between past and present tense. The writing is deliberately clunky. Chbosky is trying to sound like a 15 year-old boy -- and a gifted one at that -- but he does it by being wordy and stilted. I'll give an example: I am trying now to practice not to do that. He also said that I should use the vocabulary words that I learn in class like "corpulent" and "jaundice." I would use them here, but I really don't think they are appropriate in this format. My inner editor would rewrite this as: I'm trying to practice not to. He also suggested I use the vocabulary words from class like "corpulent" and "jaundice." I would, but they might not be appropriate in this format. This clunk-factor lessened after the first third, and I'm not sure if it was because I adapted or because the character was maturing. Either way, it does provide a bit of youthful feel and the frank honesty of the voice is highly engaging. Charlie is a straightforward reporter, cold even, rarely leaping to extreme judgement. He is most definitely not snarky. For me, the early 90s setting was a big plus, as it's free of some of the annoying distractions of the post internet age (cel phones, Facebook, etc). It's also nostalgic, being closer to my own high school era, even if Charlie is a good seven years younger (my Freshman year was 1984, his 1991). The character development is very good. Charlie, Sam, and Patrick are all very well crafted and distinct. Likable too. In retrospect, after finishing the book, I feel several elements of the story construction are a little forced. It seems unlikely that two seniors like Sam and Patrick would take a Freshman under their wing and into their social circle quite so easily. Not impossible, just a bit contrived. More substantially, the major "twist" in the story feels a bit forced, unnecessary even. This is a book with a clear theme. The writer even states it, several times: "We accept the love we think we deserve." Fine. But there sure is a lot of abuse flying around. Like 90% of the major characters experience it at some time or another in their lives. I don't mind these themes, but to have the same "startling" thing happen to not one, not two, but many characters feels forced. All this thinking was only in retrospect. While reading, the novel just draws you in from start to end. Having seen the film first, which is sexually rather tame, I was pleasantly surprised to find quite a bit of frank sexuality in the novel. I'm not sure why it was removed, and it's presence provided punch. Nevertheless, it's pretty incomprehensible that a smart well read 15 year-old like Charlie wouldn't already know about masterbation. Again, a little forced. This book has a lot of forced moments, they just play off well. So I must reiterate, these are intellectual nitpicks on a compulsively readable novel. One last observation: It's odd that Chbosky published this in 1999, went on to sell a bundle, yet has never published another novel. Andy Gavin, author of Untimed and The Darkening Dream

Perks of Being a Wallflower (Perks) is hands down one of my favorite books of all time. I bought Perks early in the morning at a bookstore after it was recommended to me the night before. The first thing I did when I returned home was begin reading it, and I didn’t set it down until I had finished. As a teenager who has read hundreds of books, many being coming-of-age novels, this is the one of the only stories I truly connected to and learned from. Perks by Stephen Chbosky is brilliantly written, with deep emotional content and powerful messages and lessons that I believe all teenagers should be exposed to. This novel is an accumulation of letters written by fifteen year old Charlie to an unknown stranger. The story is written in the voice of a freshmen boy who is just trying to get his life straight; it’s easy enough to read yet enticing with ideas. By writing in this format, readers get a view of Charlie’s uncensored thoughts and emotions as he goes through his first year of high school. One also feels a strong connection to the story because it is as though the letters are written to you, and that help builds sympathy for Charlie and causes readers to cheer him on. The story discusses many coming-of-age dilemmas such as exploring sexuallity, experimenting with drugs, family tensions, crushes and relationships, making friends and many more issues. In the story Charlie is so observant and honest - a wallflower, he loses so much information that most boys his age catch on to immediately, like dating. Charlie develops a crush on one of his friends, and shamefully confesses his dreams of her because of his guilt for having them. To his surprise “she laughed. Not a mean laugh, either. A really nice, warm laugh. She said that she thought [Charlie] was being cute” (22). This was one of Charlie’s first experiences with a girl, and his innocence shines through his writing, it’s simply extraordinary and eye-opening. For any teen growing into adulthood, this is the perfect book to read because of the issues it brings forward for the reader to reflect on. If anyone is considering to read this book, I highly recommend doing so - it is a story that can’t be missed out on. It makes a great gift, and is now a popular movie as well. Perks of Being a Wallflower is easy to fall in love with and worth the read.

It made a cry especially the most recent letter from Charlie at the end

This is one of the best book's i've ever read. I don't call myself a reader by any means but I wanted to get back into reading and this is one of the best books to do that in my opinion, the characters are fantastic the dialogue is fantastic the plot everything about this book is amazing.