Enter Title Here

by Naomi Kanakia

Overview

I'm your protagonist-Reshma Kapoor-and if you have the free time to read this book, then you're probably nothing like me.

Reshma is a college counselor's dream. She's the top-ranked senior at her ultra-competitive Silicon Valley high school, with a spotless academic record and a long roster of extracurriculars. But there are plenty of perfect students in the country, and if Reshma wants to get into Stanford, and into med school after that, she needs the hook to beat them all.

What's a habitual over-achiever to do? Land herself a literary agent, of course. Which is exactly what Reshma does after agent Linda Montrose spots an article she wrote for Huffington Post. Linda wants to represent Reshma, and, with her new agent's help scoring a book deal, Reshma knows she'll finally have the key to Stanford.

But she's convinced no one would want to read a novel about a study machine like her. To make herself a more relatable protagonist, she must start doing all the regular American girl stuff she normally ignores. For starters, she has to make a friend, then get a boyfriend. And she's already planned the perfect ending: after struggling for three hundred pages with her own perfectionism, Reshma will learn that meaningful relationships can be more important than success-a character arc librarians and critics alike will enjoy.

Of course, even with a mastermind like Reshma in charge, things can't always go as planned. And when the valedictorian spot begins to slip from her grasp, she'll have to decide just how far she'll go for that satisfying ending. (Note: It's pretty far.)

In this wholly unique, wickedly funny debut novel, Naomi Kanakia consciously uses the rules of storytelling-and then breaks them to pieces.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781484734063
Publisher:	Little, Brown Books for Young Readers
Publication date:	08/01/2017
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	352
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.80(d)
Age Range:	14 - 18 Years

About the Author

Naomi Kanakia is the author of two young adult novels, and a third will be released in 2024. She also has books for adults forthcoming from Feminist Press and Princeton University Press. 

Editorial Reviews

05/16/2016
Reshma Kapoor will do anything to ensure her spot as valedictorian, including suing her school for changing its grading policy just prior to her senior year. The lawsuit—and Reshma’s subsequent op-ed in the Huffington Post, “Double Standards for Asian Students”—lead her to sign with a literary agent, Linda Montrose, telling her that she has been working on a YA novel (which she has not). Like Linda, who believes the diary-like manuscript Reshma assembles is fictional, readers will easily fall for debut author Kanakia’s heroine, even when she’s at her most ruthless or misguided. When Reshma realizes that a good book needs romance and friendship, she approaches these hurdles in her typically calculating way: she blackmails Alex (a classmate who has been selling her Adderall) into being her best friend and starts making romantic overtures toward another student, Aakash. Kanakia’s mordantly funny story of an overachiever who takes “write what you know” to new extremes will give college-bound readers (and their parents) a gentle wake-up call that success can come in a variety of forms. Ages 14–up. Agent: John Cusick, Folio Literary Management. (Aug.)

Publishers Weekly

10/01/2016
Gr 9 Up—Any student who has ever been the victim of a teacher's favoritism toward a classmate or felt the sting of subtle but undeniable discrimination will love to hate Reshma Kapoor. Determined to get into Stanford despite her relatively low SAT scores, she'll stop at nothing to be top of her class. But to guarantee her acceptance, Reshma needs to stand out from all of the other Silicon Valley overachievers, and she thinks she's found the perfect hook. She's going to publish a novel before the end of senior year. There's just one problem; her publisher wants a story that young people will appreciate, but Reshma knows nothing about being a normal teen. So she assigns herself a six-week research project in which she must make a friend, attend a party, find a boyfriend, and have sex—and she is not afraid to use blackmail. Just as she's beginning to accomplish her goals, however, she's accused of plagiarism. Everything she's worked so hard for her entire academic career is on the line. But there is not a defeatist bone in Reshma's body, and she won't go down without dragging everyone else with her. Teens will relate to the outrageous academic pressure, subjective bias, ethnic discrimination, and cutthroat business dealings that have led to Reshma's deplorable behavior. Her encounters with friend Alex and her unbalanced therapist will keep readers laughing. VERDICT This book will do well among teens wherever academic expectations run high.—Cary Frostick, formerly at Mary Riley Styles Public Library, Falls Church, VA

School Library Journal