Review: Prim Improper by Deirdre Sullivan

Prim Improper by Deirdre Sullivan
Published: September 10th, 2010 (Little Island)
Pages: 250
Source: for review
Challenge: none
Series: none
Buy the book: Bookdepository
Rating: ★★☆☆☆ ½


Primrose Leary has just started secondary school.

Likes: her pet rat, Roderick; her best friend, Joel; being a little bit different (but not in the weird different sense – she wouldn’t like to be the only bald girl in her class or the only girl who always smelled of ham, or anything).

Dislikes: living with Fintan (her moustachioed dad); the boy-school that Joel’s toddled off to without her; not having her mum around any more.

It’s been a while and I’m still unsure about what I should think of this book. Prim Improper started off promising enough, with enough potential to keep me reading, but in the end, it just wasn’t for me.

The entire book is written in semi-diary style, following Prim in her daily life while she tries to deal with living with her father after her mum died in an accident. We see what she does every day, both at home and at school and with therapy in between. Maybe I am missing something, but I felt like the story was clueless. I didn’t feel like the story was going anywhere, and I didn’t feel like it was particularly character or plot driven. It just fell flat because the story and the characters didn’t come alive.

The reason I kept reading was because I was hoping this would be a similar style book to Confessions of Georgia Nicolson, which I loved. But it wasn’t. I felt like maybe the author had tried to make it like Georgia, but failed. Because it wasn’t as funny, and it wasn’t going anywhere.

When I read the reviews that are out there for this book, I feel like I’m missing something trivial. I’ve only seen positive reviews and I fail to understand why this book is awesome. Yeah, I kept reading, because there were funny bits that were very promising, but on the next page we would just hear more about Prim’s ramblings.

No, this definitely wasn’t a book for me. I sincerely hope that I’m indeed missing something, because the world could do with a good humorous series starring a teenage girl.