The disreputable history of Frankie Landau-Banks by E. Lockhart
Hyperion, 2009. ISBN 978-0786838196
(Age 14+) Recommended. Frankie Landau-Banks
suddenly finds
herself in the limelight at her exclusive boarding school. She manages
to
attract the attention of a popular boy Matthew and as his girlfriend
finds that
she has been elevated from obscurity and now belongs to the 'in' group.
However
she discovers that girls are not treated the same way as boys are in
the group
and in particular they are excluded from the secret society, the Loyal
Order of
the Basset Hounds. When she finds The
Disreputable History, the long lost manual of the club, she decides
that
she will grab some of the power that has previously belonged just to
the boys.
Using a fake e-mail address, she directs the activities of the club,
getting
the members to do audacious pranks until her plotting is discovered.
Frankie is a girl who is determined not to be
ignored, and
refuses to be relegated into doing
'female' activities. She thinks that coming up with wonderful practical
jokes
and getting the old boys' club to carry out her instructions will give
her
power and gain respect, but finds to her dismay that discrimination is
deeply
embedded in society. Whilst determined to prove herself an equal with
the boys,
she doesn't realise that she herself is fitting into a mould by waiting
around
for Matthew when he dumps her for Basset meetings, and still hoping
that after
everything goes haywire, he will be there for her.
A feature of the book that stood out for me was
the humorous
wordplays and the literary allusions to Wodehouse. Frankie had lots of
fun
making up words and meanings and this added a richness to the story
telling and
gave insights into Frankie's intelligence and personality.
Lockhart explores feminism, discrimination, peer
pressure
and the networks that give power in this complex, funny and witty
exploration
of one girl's attempt to be in the right group with the right cute
boyfriend.
Pat Pledger