My Most Excellent Year: A Novel of Love, Mary Poppins, and Fenway Park by Steve Kluger

From the Publisher

Dear Anthony:

I appreciate your recent interest, but I'm not accepting applications at this time. Your letter will be kept in our files and someone will get back to you if there is an opening. Thank you for thinking of me.

Respectfully,

Alejandra Perez

P.S. It's not "Allie." It's "Ale."

Meet T.C., who is valiantly attempting to get Alejandra to fall in love with him; Alejandra, who is playing hard to get and is busy trying to sashay out from under the responsibilities of being a diplomat's daughter; and T.C.'s brother Augie, who is gay and in love and everyone knows it but him.

The Washington Post - Elizabeth Ward

My Most Excellent Year is funny, affecting, smart and surprising, too: There are bit parts here for Julie Andrews and the Manzanar National Historic Site. And when the whole hodgepodge cast is assembled for the climactic moment, it's as good as a Broadway curtain call—or a neighborhood outing to Fenway.

Publishers Weekly

Three teens complete an English assignment detailing their "most excellent year" in this big, warmhearted tale about musical theater, political organizing, baseball, friendship and love. Tony Conigliaro Keller (named like everyone in his family for a Boston Red Sox player) and Augie Hwong have been self-declared brothers since age six, when T.C.'s mother died. Entering high school, everyone but Augie knows that Augie is gay, which finally dawns on him when he falls for another student. Meanwhile, T.C. develops an intense crush on the novel's third essayist, Alé Perez, daughter of a Mexican diplomat now teaching at Harvard. While T.C. and his father share a baseball obsession, Augie and Alé get close when both are cast in Kiss Me, Kate. The essay segments are spliced with diary entries (T.C.'s are addressed to his mother, Alé's to Jacqueline Kennedy); e-mails from and between parents, teachers and Alé's former Secret Service agent; reprints of Augie's mother's hilariously excoriating theater reviews; transcripts of IM sessions. The characters are a little too good to be true, and there's a distracting and improbable subplot about a deaf motherless child obsessed with Mary Poppins. The protagonists sometimes sound more like 40-year-olds than teens; however, the results are unexpectedly positive, opening up the audience to adults as well as the target reader. Ages 12-up. (Mar.)

Horn Book

Kluger's easy-breezy and thoroughly absorbing novel channels the hearts, heads, and hormones of three high school students.

Children's Literature

Ms. LaFontaine assigns the students in her 11th grade class to write about "My Most Excellent Year," and T.C. Keller, Augie Hwong, and Alejandra Perez more than meet the challenge. We flash back to join them in their journey through high school, from freshman year to their moment as "practically seniors." Through assignments, instant messages, emails, journals, and other autobiographical glimpses, we experience the joys and sorrows of love, friendship, heartbreak, and loss through their eyes. The voices of the three main characters, as well as the supporting cast that surrounds them, are clear and compelling. T.C. is struggling to come to terms with his mother's death and reaches out to help a young orphan. Augie is trying to understand his feelings and how to fit into a world that might not accept his way of loving. Alejandra does not feel she belongs in her family's world or in the future they have projected for her. As their lives converge, these three adolescents find what is best in each other, themselves, and the world around them. Some of the subject matter is serious, but Kluger has a light touch and the characters (and readers) never lose hope. Reviewer: Carol Ann Lloyd-Stanger

KLIATT

AGERANGE: Ages 12 to 18.

Charming, complex, with three enormously talented narrators plus many other fully realized characters. The format is challenging: each narrator writes letters to dead heroes (e.g., Ale writes to Jacqueline Kennedy) in which intimate feelings are revealed; the friends communicate by e-mail and by text message, and there is generally a lot going on, let’s say. It is a school year in which Augie and TC, who have known each other as best friends since they were six, become friends with the talented and beautiful Ale, a new student, and all three discover their own dreams. Ale (Alejandra) is the daughter of sophisticated diplomats who discovers how much she wants to pursue a career as a performer. It’s Augie, the talented director of the school musical, who gives her the place to find this out about herself. TC, brilliant and something of a slacker, gets focused and does better in school, falling in love and trying to keep up with Ale. Everyone has known that Augie is gay and when he finally falls in love with another boy and acknowledges this about himself, everyone, including his parents, is delighted for him. It would be just another inventive school story except for the presence of Hucky--an amazingly endearing six-year-old orphan who is deaf. TC and Hucky meet because of baseball and their shared love of the Red Sox. TC’s mother died when he was six, so he is very sensitive to the needs of such a devastated child. TC learns sign language so he can communicate with Hucky, and there is a whole story here about their bringing Hucky into their family. This is a sophisticated story that will especially entertain smart readers who can intellectually and socially keepup with these memorable characters and their quick minds. Of course, those who love the city of Boston will enjoy the setting and Kluger’s familiarity with it. Reviewer: Claire Rosser
March 2008 (Vol. 42, No.2)

School Library Journal

Gr 8-11- Three bright and funny Brookline, MA, eleventh graders look back on their most excellent year-ninth grade-for a school report. Told in alternating chapters by each of them, this enchanting, life-affirming coming-of-age story unfolds through instant messages, emails, memos, diary entries, and letters to celebrity divas and to a deceased mom. T.C. (Anthony Conigliaro) Keller, whose mother died when he was six, is in love with baseball and Alejandra (Alé) Perez. She and Augie Hwong, who is gay and in love with Andy Wexler, are passionate about the stage and screen, and Augie and T.C. have been "brothers" since they were six. The teens mount a fabulous talent show, launch a couple of grassrooots political movements, and bring hope and love to a deaf, six-year-old foster child. What's more, Augie and T.C. have a refreshingly positive relationship with their parents. Similar in storytelling style to Kate Klise's classic Regarding the Fountain: A Tale, in Letters, of Liars and Leaks (Avon, 1998), this is a rich and humorous novel for older readers. The teen and adult characters are quirky and charming, and their adventures are involving without being over-the-top. A fun, feel-good story with star quality.-Sharon Senser McKellar, Oakland Public Library, CA

Kirkus Reviews

How many novels have such a cast of characters: A Red Sox addict who writes letters to his dead mother; his gay American-born Chinese "brother"; a love interest whose role model is Jacqueline Kennedy and who's the daughter of the ambassador to Mexico; a young boy who thinks Mary Poppins is real; and a father romancing his son's school adviser? Kluger's foray into young-adult literature does, and it all works wonderfully in a modern-day tale of baseball, romance, Broadway musicals and even baseball at the Manzanar National Historic Site. Written in letters, instant messages, school assignments and e-mails, this romantic comedy is pure fun. T.C., Augie, Alejandra, Andy and others find that romance means learning to see with new eyes and becoming new under the influence of magic in the world. The many characters are well-drawn and believable, and readers will care about them. The innovative format works well in relating the multiple love stories, and the story ought to appeal to a wide range of readers. (Fiction. 12+)

Product Details

• ISBN: 0803732279
  
• ISBN-13: 9780803732278
• Format: Hardcover, 416pp
• Publisher: Dial Books for Young Readers
• Pub. Date: March 2008
• Edition Description: Reprint
• Sales Rank: 53,889
• Age Range: Young Adult