Celine [Hardcover]

Brock Cole (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: October 1989

Before Celine, a sixteen-year-old artist, can take a promised trip to Europe, she must show a little maturity, finish an overdue term paper and support her seven-year-old neighbor during his parent's separation.

Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

The typical girl-meets-boy story gets turned inside out in this witty, offbeat novel. Yes, the title character ends up with Jake, the boy next door, only he's still in grade school and wears Superman underwear. Celine, a budding artist, wants to graduate from high school a year early and live with her best friend in Italy. All she has to do first is, according to her absent father, "show a little maturity," which Celine interprets as "pass all your courses, avoid detection in all crimes and misdemeanors, don't get pregnant." The last item is the easiest; sex is a complete mystery. But although Celine is smart enough--maybe too smart--she's going to fail English unless she squeezes out an essay on Holden Caulfield, and she's skipped her mandatory swimming class all term. Celine is confident that she can finagle her way around the authorities at school, but she can't manage her emotions so easily. She finally goes to pieces during a therapy session that she wanders into by mistake, but which--always Celine--she turns to her advantage. Adrift in a confusing world, Cole's ( The Goats ) irrepressible heroine somehow manages to get the best of almost every situation by talking rings around her bemused adversaries. Her wry comments on everything from modern art to divorce are as perspicacious as they are delightful. Ages 12-up.
Copyright 1989 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Review

"Vivid and intelligent."--Starred, School Library Journal

"Celine is one of the wittiest narrators to step out of the pages of young adult fiction...Her targets range from modern art to televangelism and her aim is true."--The Washington Post

"An original and disarming first-person narrative about a sixteen-year-old artist and her irresolute yearnings to find a center to her life...[A] mature, fully realized work, and one that sees an exciting author, with an authentic new voice, emerging as an important spokesman for contemporary young adults."--Starred, The Horn Book

"Start to finish, this book is a delight. It is funny, witty and poignant."--The New York Times Book Review

--This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Hardcover: 216 pages
• Publisher: Farrar Straus & Giroux (J); 1st edition (October 1989)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0374312346
• ISBN-13: 978-0374312343
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.7 x 1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (13 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #3,242,415 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Portrait of the Artist as a Teenage Girl, April 24, 2001

By 

todd (Columbus Ga) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Celine (A Sunburst Book) (Paperback)

In this book, Brock Cole introduces us to Celine Morienval, a sixteen-year-old high school student living in Chicago. Celine is a talented artist and all-around bright kid, who has a fairly good idea of what she wants to do. Her parents are divorced; her professor father has married one of his students, Catherine, who is only six years older than Celine. He has chosen to let stepmother and stepdaughter work out the details of their relationship while he attends to pressing academic business in Europe and remains an invisible presence throughout the story. Celine's has a well-developed sense of irony that she unleashes on her family situation with great humor. Her attitude towards family matters is remarkably mature.

Celine hopes to graduate from high school a year early, but is having trouble closing the deal. She has not fulfilled her athletic requirement and is under the gun to finish a paper on The Catcher in the Rye in order to pass English. She hopes to live her own life after graduation with friends in Europe, but has, at this point, neither a definite plan nor parental permission. When it comes to the nuts and bolts of life, she shows her youth and inexperience. Socially, she is well outside the confines of the female teenage "box." She has little interest in clothes, sex, drugs, rock'n'roll, etc. She relaxes by vegetating in front of the television.

Her time has been co-opted by Jake, an eight-year-old boy who lives in the next apartment and whose parents have separated. Celine always treats Jake kindly and respectfully, unlike his foolish parents. In doing so, she shows her essential good nature.

The novel ends before Celine can accomplish all her objectives. The plot deals mainly with the humorous obstacles that life places in her path. She maintains a remarkable narrative voice throughout the book (she is the narrator). In fact, it was impossible (for me) to separate her voice from that of the author, Brock Cole. This is by no means a defect of the book-it explains her remarkable fluency without detracting from her charm.

6 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best Book Ever, Period, October 26, 1999

By A Customer

This review is from: Celine (A Sunburst Book) (Paperback)

I first read this book in junior high, and have been re-reading it ever since ( I'm a freshman in college, now). I absolutely, positively love this book. This book may be hard for certain readers to enjoy, because it is written in such an original, frank, lyrical way, and the views of the narrator, Celine, may be very different from the views of the readers. However, myself being a child of divorce with a step-parent I hardly ever get along with, I connected with this book in a way I don't think the author ever intended. Celine's views on life, people, divorce, friendship, everything are right on. Sometimes I think Brock Cole was peering into the murky depths of my head when he was writing this book. Celine's obnoxious, unwanted boyfirend, Dermot, is extremely realistic; I've met other versions of him, and how she puts up with him is eerliy similar to real life. So are all the other characters in the book; every one is like someone I know in real life. Their actions and reactions, which Cole paints expertly and subtly, are perfectly realistic, and Celine's views of these people are insightful and true. What is so extremely good about this book is how it takes all of our modern culture and, through subtle writing and not-so-subtle writing, shows it for what it is. Everything Celine sees or thinks about her society is dead-on. The people she interacts with are true to life. I love this book, and getting a chance to peek in on a life through this book so very much like my own. Celine is filled with great humor, insight, and wisdom. The writing is superb. I recommend this book to anyone who liked The Saskiad, The Bell Jar, She's Come Undone, The Goats (of course), Cress Delahanty, The Catcher in the Wry (or anything else by Salinger), or anything written through the eyes of a wise, mature, insightful, different, humorous girl.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Achingly funny, October 3, 2001

By 

Katherine A. Robertus "siouxsiez" (Kansas City, MO USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Celine (A Sunburst Book) (Paperback)

This book is my A+ #1 absolute favorite book of all time. I have reread it at least once a year since it came out and it never fails to blow my mind. The characters are realistic, Celine's narration is hilarious, and the melancholy honesty makes it an invaluable novel for teen and adult readers. Seriously -- everyone must like this book.