A Vintage Reads Review: Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging

Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging (Confessions of Georgia Nicolson, 1) by Louise Rennison, April 11, 2006. 247 pages. Published by HarperTeen. Source: borrowed from sister.

There are six things very wrong with my life:

1. I have one of those under-the-skin spots that will never come to a head but lurk in a red way for the next two years.
2. It is on my nose
3. I have a three-year-old sister who may have peed somewhere in my room.
4. In fourteen days the summer hols will be over and then it will be back to Stalag 14 and Oberfuhrer Frau Simpson and her bunch of sadistic teachers.
5. I am very ugly and need to go into an ugly home.
6. I went to a party dressed as a stuffed olive.

In this wildly funny journal of a year in the life of Georgia Nicolson, British author Louise Rennison has perfectly captured the soaring joys and bottomless angst of being a teenager. In the spirit of Bridget Jones's Diary, this fresh, irreverent, and simply hilarious book will leave you laughing out loud. As Georgia would say, it's "Fabbity fab fab!"

First Sentence:

Dad had Uncle Eddie round, so naturally they had to come and see what I was up to.

Well, I had been considering reading Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging for a while now, as it has been sitting on my sister's shelf for ages. It was not nearly as good as I was hoping, especially after the last book I was reading pretty much killed my good reading streak (last book bored me).

While the writing was pretty good, my problem with the first Georgia Nicolson book arises with Georgia herself. I just did not care for her all that much; she was rude to her family, ungrateful, and not the good of a friend. I am sorry to say that there were hardly any redeeming qualities in her, although, to be fair, I did enjoy her antics when it came to her cat Angus and the story of how he came to be with their family.
    Even though I had my problems with Georgia, I can see why most readers enjoyed her craziness. But for me, I found it hard to even smirk over some of the things she said and did because they just made her look like a fool half the time. While I'm sure we are meant to laugh at the pitfalls in her life, I think it would have been more interesting to see her be somewhat serious at times about serious things.
 
So, as you've noticed I had many problems with my first Louise Rennison book. Even though there were many things I disliked about Georgia, what I enjoyed most was Louise Rennison's writing. Why, because she knew how to write a well paced book that kept you reading-even if like me, you found yourself not liking the main character. If it hadn't been for her writing and the way she captured the (slightly messed up) family dynamics within the Nicolson family I probably wouldn't have finished this one.
    In short, the writing is good, but the main character, personality-wise, leaves something to be desired.

The things that I disliked the most about this book would have to be Georgia's overly dramatic take on everything, as well, as they way she would say things in poor jest. There were a couple things she said that left me scratching my head because it wasn't funny in the least and was not something should be joked about, and wondering just why the author thought to have her character say that.
     As you can see, I probably would have enjoyed the book more if it had featured more Angus and less Georgia. While that's not to say that the book is bad as a whole, there was just not much humor found in it for me.

Final Verdict: Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging- While I enjoyed most of the British slang and the crazy Angus, I don't think this was the book for me.

Angus, Thongs and Full-Frontal Snogging earns 3 out of 5 griffins