The Great American Whatever, by Tim Federle

The Great American Whatever marks author Tim Federle's debut in YA fiction.  Federle is also the author of the middle grade novels Better Nate Than Ever and Five, Six, Seven, Nate!.  (He's also written cocktail books for adults, one of which is called Tequila Mockingbird which wins for best punny title).  In his few published works thus far, Federle writes what he knows.  In the Nate books, he used his own experiences on Broadway to write about a boy who wants to make in on the Big White Way.  In this newest work, we follow the journey of seventeen-year-old Quinn, a closeted movie buff from Pittsburgh (Federle's home town).  I give this little bit of backstory because as much as I wanted to embrace The Great American Whatever, it felt a little distant for me.  I never found Quinn's voice to be fully authentic.  It sounded too much like adult-Tim in the guise of a teenager.  (In the acknowledgements at the end, Federle says that the book was initially written with the characters about ten years older.)

The Great American Whatever follows the first summer Quinn spends without his sister, Annabeth, who died in a texting-related car crash six months earlier.  Quinn and Annabeth were a filmmaking team; he wrote the screenplays and his sister directed.  Without her, Quinn feels desperately empty and lost.  He also feels responsible for the wreck that took her life, since he was the one she was texting.  Slowly, Quinn crawls out of his grief thanks to his best friend, Geoff, and a cute older boy he meets at a college party.  Peppered throughout the novel are sample screenplay directions, as Quinn imagines his life the way a filmmaker would:

EXT. GEOFF'S PERFECT LAWN - NIGHT

Quinn takes Geoff by the lapels and flings him onto the lawn.  He straddles Geoff and digs his knee right between Geoff's ribs.

QUINN

Seriously.  Explain yourself so that I don't freak out.

Again, as much as I wanted to really love this book, it was only ok for me.  I think Federle needs a little more time to really find his voice in YA fiction.  This is a perfectly solid debut for older teens, but similar themes have been done explored elsewhere and with greater resonance in YA lit.