Twelve

Rating:
Summary: Spare, yet compelling
Review: You'll finish this book in about three hours. It moves at a lightning fast pace due to a noticeable lack of description, minuscule chapters, and plenty of white space on the page. While the book is very surface-oriented, one has to keep in mind that it is meant to be a satire, and shouldn't be taken all that seriously. The denouement is a bit abrupt and not surprising given what's been in the news over the last several years. But in the end, McDonell moves the story along, ties several smaller plotlines together, and makes you want to finish the book. And isn't that the point - to make you want to finish the book?

Rating:
Summary: That was four hours of my life I will never get back....
Review: The editorial reviews for this book are good. I thought they may be a little optimistic - trying to give a new, young author a little boost. I wanted to like this book for that same reason. I was sorely disappointed. I found the story to be choppy and rather pointless. Completely without value. Am I being harsh? Probably. Given the number of outstanding, average, and mediocre books out there, I resent wasting even a moment of my time reading a truly horrible one.

So, I say to the professionals who reviewed this book: What about the rest of us? It is nice of you to give this young man a little ego boost, but based on your reviews, hundreds of people wasted their valuable time and money. Send me a list of books you liked so I know not to read them!

Rating:
Summary: Twelve
Review: Please note that of all of the reviews, the highest ratings were given by 13-year-olds who spell recommend with two c's. That said, Twelve is a predictable adolescent novel with a ridiculous ending that turns what could be interesting characters into nothing more than caricatures: the pretty, but snobby girl, the angry teens, etc. If you want a quick read that won't leave you caring about its characters or plot, go out and buy. If you want to learn something new about NYC's teenaged elite, this is not the book for you.

Rating:
Summary: he did a great job fooling a bunch of middle-aged reviewers!
Review: twelve is absolutely unremarkable. whereas ms. rowling's harry potter manages to transcend its original filing of "children's fiction" to become a favorite amongst adult readers of otherwise 'serious' literature, twelve, alas, is hardly even palatable as 'young adult fiction', contrary to scores of newspapers, magazines and literati who claim that this book is seriously stunning. i cannot independently verify the verisimilitude of his work, since i have never had the privilege of living in a multimillion dollar townhouse in new york and waking up to discover that i have complete blockheads for friends, but when he, like, makes that sara ludlow chick, like, talk with a lot of, like, stereotypical teenager words, like, the word like, and, he has her speak, like, this, like, oh my god, like, i never, like, noticed that, like, teenaged airheads, like, talk, like this. like oh my god, like, whenever i pretend to pretend i'm from california, i, like, say fo' sho' and fo' shizzle mah nizzle like, a lot, and, like, end my sentences with, like, yo.

but aside from the lack of significant imagery (and i believe that books can be wonderful despite that; see ayn rand's we the living), twelve is flawed in its description of teenage-human psyche. the characters are all shallow, unbelieveable. mcdonnell certainly attempts to make this otherwise, but even the two characters who are actually distinguishable from the mass of cannon (read: bullet) fodder, claude and white mike, lay rather supine on the page. i, for one, had only the faintest inkling that claude would be pulling out the uzi and going bang, though in the context of the novel, it shouldn't have surprised me -- that's just what the stereotype would do. why? i like knives. i like guns. i wear black all the time. but i'm not going to go around shooting these random kids who are partying in my house, because i'm not a stand-up cardboard character made of media stereotype. i get the feeling that mcdonnell is trying to do something meaningful with these characters, especially white mike, but all the detritus that he mentions, the fragmentary evidence... none of it adds up to the emotional basis for the actions of these characters. i'm not seeing the motivation; i'm not feeling the psychosis and despair or lethargy. (is it despair? what is it, exactly, that mcdonnell wanted white mike to be like?)

puh-leaze. the reviews say mcdonnell is the next bret ellis easton. they say he's the voice of this generation, my generation. i say he's the voice of a single white, privileged, rich kid in new york. nick mcdonnell may have had a story worth telling, if he had bothered to tell his own story instead of trying to deal with a very multifaceted teenage nihilismus. mcdonnell's novel, selection of detail, voice all suggest that he is a teenage delinquent, cynical and jaded about all that he sees around him, and wants to speak up about it. that's great, sure. but that's not all that special.

twelve is a perfectly appropriate title for mcdonnell's debut: it is a book worthwhile only to twelve year olds who have yet to develop the critical thinking skills that would reveal what a waste of paper this is. save the trees and give me your publishing contract, kthx.

Rating:
Summary: Stuck on a plane with nothing to read
Review: It caught my attention at the airport because a)it was written by a 17 year old and b)I am from NY. I shouldn't have bothered. I finished the book in 2 hours have not spent one moment reflecting on it since. I felt that the story was extremely predictable. You can't fault the writer, he is just a teenager... but what were the publishers thinking? It was like a mad-libs story - we've heard it before... they just changed the characters names, drug name etc...

Rating:
Summary: The real "Twelve" Review
Review: From a teenager's standpoint, this book was an accurate account of the party life for spoiled, rich kids. People have been bashing this book, but I was captivated and could not put it down. The people who don't understand or appreciate the novel are adults who grew up in the 50's and wouldn't know contemporary literature if it bit them in the ( you know where). I loved this novel and hope others will enjoy it as well.

Rating:
Summary: what it feels like
Review: the book most certainly has it's flaws. it is at times disjointed and clouded with background noise. despite this, i couldn't help feeling the it worthwhile, even good. it is an honest portrait that pulls you in. the author has captured exactly what the book's world feels like. while it's unclear what the book's message is (or if it has one), it is razor sharp and at times, enormously funny.

Rating:
Summary: I would recommend this...
Review: I would recommend this novel only to the most utterly bored, angst ridden teenager. The characters have little depth, especially the girls (or women, you decide) whose characters lie solely in their outward appearance, level of easiness, and drug use. A reviewer by the name of Hunter Thompson writes, "The ratio of age to talent is horrifying..." I couldn't disagree with this statement any more, McDonnell's novel reeks of the ADHD plaguing today's adolescents. His prose is terse and undeveloped, the episodic story line is choppy, and each chapter consists of no more than a few pages.

I found the characters to be dull, with the exception of the comic relief provided by Timmy and Mark Rothko. How many novels and films can one make about materially rich teens who have to rely on drugs because their parents spend all of their time in Brussels? This plot is losing steam fast, as far as I am concerned.

I considered giving this book three stars because of the shock value of the penultimate chapter. But, I later decided that all this violence losses any lasting impression, because the Afterword is such a cop-out. If you decide to read "Twelve," try to find it at the library, don't waste your $$.

Rating:
Summary: It Sure Ain't "Catcher In The Rye..."
Review: well i gotta tell ya, it plays out like the movie "Kids" where the writer goes for the shock value of showing us what it is like from his point of view to know a bunch of young self-destructive losers. "twelve" is a dumb name for a drug and i didn't buy one reason why this one hot girl gets hooked on it. the characters are mostly believable but the writer isn't much different from all the other upstarts who want to either gross you out or show how hip they are by using the "n-word" all over the place - something white writers LOVE to do. read it if you have nothing better to do.

Rating:
Summary: Shows promise, but doesn't quite deliver
Review: The first thing that becomes apparent when reading "Twelve" is that the author has lived a privledged life. Not only did he get a novel published before his eighteenth birthday, but the narrative itself is full of shallow, underdeveloped characters. Now, I would consider these good characterizations of the social classes McDonnel describes, as I haven't met many wealthy people who have more going for them than their wealth and idleness.

While "Twelve" has been compared to Bret Easton Ellis I didn't see much of connection other than dealing with the same socio-economic class. Whereas Ellis is a moralist at heart, showing the emptiness a amorality that lie at the heart of his characters, McDonnel seems blissfully unaware that the majority of people on the planet don't live like kings.

All in all, though, I'd say "Twelve" shows real promise. The prose is tight (although that could be the work of a good editor) and the novel flows well. If you're looking for a serious morality tale of contemporary culture, I'd suggest either Ellis or A. M. Homes, but if you've always wanted to read the diary of an Upper East Side jet set's kid, then "Twelve" is right up your alley.