Vibes, by Amy Kathleen Ryan
Author: Amy Kathleen Ryan
Genre: YA
Pages: 249
Rating: 4 out of 5 stars (really liked it)
I finally read Vibes, after meeting the author at my library’s Author Open House last April and having a wonderful talk about writing for teens and her new book. At the time, I felt stupid for not having read the books of all the YA authors who were visiting our library, but she was super nice about it, and she even signed my ARC for me. I promised I’d read it. Then I took it home and put it on a shelf and forgot about it.
Yeah, that’s me - lazy, slacker-type procrastinator.
So, anyway, I picked Vibes up because I wanted something short and funny to read to offset Blackout, which I slogged through slowly but determinedly, really enjoying parts and skimming others in frustration. But this is not my review for Blackout, so I’ll shut up about that.
Vibes is quite funny. And short. So it worked perfectly.
Summary poached from Goodreads:
Nothing is beyond Kristi Carmichael's disdain-her hippie high school, her friend Jacob, her workaholic mom. Yet for all her attitude and her mind-reading abilities, Kristi has a vulnerable side. She can hear the thoughts of her fellow students, calling her fat and gross. She's hot for Gusty Peterson, one of the most popular guys in school, but of course, she's sure he thinks she is disgusting. And she's still mad at her father, who walked out on them two years ago. Soon, a school project brings her together with Gusty, her father comes home and drops a bombshell, and a friend comes out of the closet, and suddenly she is left doubting that she can read people at all.
I wasn't sure if my review contained spoilers, so I'm placing it behind a cut just in case, but I think the spoilers are minor. Mostly, I talk about Krisi's character and why I think her psychic powers are an extended metaphor for being a teenager, and I talk a little about why characters in this book remind me of my own self in high school.
Kristi is my kind of unlikable narrator. She isn’t one of the A-list mean girls, but no one would call her nice. She’s self-absorbed and has a nasty sense of humor. She incredibly judgmental, but she spends so much of her time noticing how much everyone else is judging her (for being fat; for dressing in unusual, home-made clothes; for having big boobs, or no father, etc.), she doesn’t notice how terrible she is herself. But she’s so funny and clever that I still liked reading from her POV. Also, she reminded me of how self-conscious and negative and defensively sarcastic I was at her age (only she is a lot funnier and meaner than I was). I understood where she was coming from, and that made her sympathetic even when I didn’t like her as a person.
The story itself involves typical teenage novel stuff: family, school, romance. Her dad comes back and turns out to be kind of a jerk, disappointing her when she had remembered him so fondly. She likes a boy and isn’t sure how he feels about her; meanwhile, another boy she doesn’t like that way makes his move and freaks her out. She’s still smarting over a previous friend’s betrayal. She and her mom don't understand each other and they fight. It’s the strength of the character that carries this novel (well, and the strength of the first person narrative, which is very capably written), rather than the originality of the plot.
Especially, and painfully, true for me is the character of Mallory (the boy who Kristi doesn’t like that way), who has terrible, terrible acne. He is both self-conscious and defiant about it, daring people to react and trying hard not so show how much their reactions bother him. I had terrible acne as a teen (it’s still pretty bad now at times) and my last year of high school/first year of college was so terrible that I felt like a circus freak. I hated going out in public, and I was hopelessly depressed that I would always be this monster people would stare at, and I would never have a normal relationship with friends or have sex because of my face. I still remember catching a glimpse of myself late at night in one of the dorm bathroom mirrors and feeling like I was going to die of shame and horror. I think this was the most painful period of my life, and Ryan really captures what that feels like (even though we only see Mallory through Kristi’s ruthlessly negative impressions).
Kristi’s psychic powers are not mind reading so much as being hyper-aware of the negative things other people are thinking about her (or, as it turns out, what Kristi thinks they are thinking about her). It’s basically a big plot device, used to characterize her and create conflict, but it works for me. Kristi is so sure she knows what everyone is thinking that she doesn’t pay attention to the clues that don’t fit; and, as it turns out, she is wrong about everything. She misunderstands the simplest thoughts and behaviors, makes incorrect assumptions based on them, treats those assumptions as black-and-white Truth, and then has the gall to be surprised when someone finally calls her on it.
For some people, I think this story will succeed or fail based totally on how they feel about the psychic powers. They are a vehicle for character growth (Kristi has to change one she realizes how much her powers have led her to misunderstand others) and you either accept them or you don’t. For me, the psychic powers work as an extended metaphor for what it’s like to be a teenager. Think about it: You’re sure everyone is judging you; you dislike lots of things about yourself, and whatever you dislike the most seems like the one thing everyone else notices; you want to fit in, but you also want to stand out. I can go with the idea that Kristi obsessed about all this SO MUCH that she develops an ability that reinforces what she already thinks, like creating her own self-fulfilling prophecy. It ended up not mattering to me whether Kristi was psychic or not -- the point is, she believes she is, and it's given her an excuse to think the worst of everyone and therefore not try to understand them, keeping herself "safe".
I know I'm painting with broad strokes here, but this is how I remember it, and this is how it seems like when I reread my journals from junior high and high school. (Seriously - it wasn’t only me, right?) I really, really feel that Ryan “gets” what it’s like to be a teenager and has written a smart, funny story about it. The happy ending is a bit fairy tale, but I also appreciated it nonetheless.