Ghostworld

Oh lord, I had so much trouble reading this. The main characters were just so darn frustrating. I tried to sit down and read it straight through but I got so pissed off I just couldn't do it. By the end I was fairly okay with the characters and the people they had become but throughout most of the novel I had serious difficulty willing myself from panel to panel.

The girls in Ghostworld are just so immature. They refuse to show that they like or are interested in anything for fear that showing legitimate interest will cause them to be ridiculed. And so they mock everything and everyone just to make themselves feel better but it doesn't work, it just leaves them feeling more empty and confused about who they are and what they want to be. And I understand that, but having come out of a similar phase relatively recently, wherein I was trying to define myself and my likes and dislikes the characters were irritating on a deeply personal level, showing me what an idiot I had been and how obnoxious I must have seemed.

Despite its brevity, the novel is only 80 pages, there is a huge amount of story within a short amount of volume. Though perhaps story is not the best word as there is no traditional plot in any sense, rather the reader just gets a glimpse into the lives of two individuals and their interactions with the world with which they are trying to come to grips. The world of love and adulthood is looming and the protagonists are caught practically unawares as they are thrust into something for which they are completely mentally and emotionally unprepared.

Though they may be incredibly and intensely grating on the nerves the main caharacters of Ghostworld give a bit of an excellent insight into the mindset of a teenager coming of age in America and trying to come to terms with their place in the world.