Customer Reviews

Keeping Up Appearances

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Ann Roberts' ninth novel is set in 2004 in a Phoenix, Arizona middle school and covers one school year. Faye Burton is the principal, and while not dumpy is less concerned with what she wears because experience has taught her it is always possible that one or more of the students she talks to in the course of the school day will end up leaving something behind, a greasy handprint, tear stains, or a crayon mark.. While the school year is still young, she meets the District's new director of special education, Andi Loomis, who wears Prada and Armani. When the women begin dating, Andi insists that they remain deeply in the closet which is fine with Faye because the District has recently hired a homophobic Superintendent. A thorn in Faye's side is attorney Constance Richardson, whose son, AJ, is in the school's special education program. Richardson wants her son mainstreamed, i.e., put into the school's regular program of classes. The school staff knows the boy isn't capable of being mainstreamed, and have told Richardson that over and over. Richardson is adamant that AJ remain in the non-special education classrooms despite him being disruptive and increasingly violent. Richardson is vindictive, mean-spirited, and used to getting her own way in all things. Faye must deal not only with each day's crisis at the school, but the politics of the district as well. When Richardson doesn't get her way, she gets even with Faye. What Faye and Andi do after that is telling and threatens their relationship.

While there are some romantic elements to this book, it is not, strictly speaking, a romance.This book is about the bullying of gay students, the constant fear gay teachers live under if they are teaching under homophobic administrations, and survival. There are romantic elements, i.e., the budding relationship between Andi and Faye.

Roberts does a good job in developing Faye, Andi, and Constance (who is one of those characters the reader will love to hate). Unfortunately, she fails to develop the secondary adult characters in enough depth to tell one from the other. The only thing distinguishing Faye's brother from the other secondary characters is the fact that he's a man - the women characters are so similar as to be nearly indistinguishable from one another. If she had developed the secondary adults, this would have been a fully realized book. Much better developed secondary characters are the students, and, thus, more interesting than the adult secondary characters.

Readers may be chagrinned at the end of the book when both Faye and Constance act out of character. Roberts would have done her readers a favor by foreshadowing the change in both these characters beyond giving us love as the reason they would or could change in such a radical way.

Despite the minor criticisms above, Roberts' book will keep you turning pages even if you aren't a teacher or have children, and, if for no other reason than to see what deviousness Constance will be up to next.

You know, I like Ann Roberts, but often times her characters are not developed well. This book was average at best. The secondary story about the gay teens held my interest more than the primary story.

The two main characters could have been so much better. It just was not believable. They meet and all of a sudden, they are dating and in love. The love scenes were non-existant, no hot sex at all!

This book fell short and I would not waste my money!

Keeping Up Appearances is about people who struggle. Set in a middle school, the reader is taken on an exploration of the difficulties faced by lesbian teachers, the battles that revolve around special education students and the unhappiness of a child who tries to relieve her pain by cutting herself.

The interactions between the characters send several messages. Sometimes in schools and life decisions are made not in the best interests of the people involved, but because they are politically expedient. People can get so caught up in their own interests and concerns that they fail to see or understand what other people are coping with. People with good intentions can often disagree on a course of action because of their own perspectives or because they fail to comprehend another person's motivations. Prejudice comes in many forms, whether racial, sexual, economic or involving those with special needs. Finally, the life that evolves in a school is extremely complex in its relationships and subtleness. Anyone who thinks there are easy solutions to any of these situations has failed to grasp what is going on.

Ann Roberts has created a book that could be dismissed as a romance that takes place in a school, but there is a lot more going on in this story. She blends the stories together in a seamless manner. Someone might read this and only see the plot lines while missing the connections between them. That would be a shame. There is a lot to think about in this book and it deserves more attention than to just be considered another romance.

Read the product description then read this book. If you don't already respect what teachers and administrators do, this will hopefully help especially for those that assist and support our LGBT youth. The book will invoke a range of emotions as you read about bullying, homophobia, relationships and special need students. Well done and thank you Ann Roberts for all you do in your education role.