The Field Guide to the North American Teenager
Written by Ben Philippe
Narrated by James Fouhey
4/5
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About this audiobook
William C. Morris YA Debut Award Winner!
A hilarious YA contemporary realistic novel about a witty Black French Canadian teen who moves to Austin, Texas, and experiences the joys, clichés, and awkward humiliations of the American high school experience—including falling in love. Perfect for fans of Nicola Yoon, When Dimple Met Rishi, and John Green.
Norris Kaplan is clever, cynical, and quite possibly too smart for his own good. A Black French Canadian, he knows from watching American sitcoms that those three things don’t bode well when you are moving to Austin, Texas.
Plunked into a new high school and sweating a ridiculous amount from the oppressive Texas heat, Norris finds himself cataloging everyone he meets: the Cheerleaders, the Jocks, the Loners, and even the Manic Pixie Dream Girl. Making a ton of friends has never been a priority for him, and this way he can at least amuse himself until it’s time to go back to Canada, where he belongs.
Yet against all odds, those labels soon become actual people to Norris…like loner Liam, who makes it his mission to befriend Norris, or Madison the beta cheerleader, who is so nice that it has to be a trap. Not to mention Aarti the Manic Pixie Dream Girl, who might, in fact, be a real love interest in the making.
But the night of the prom, Norris screws everything up royally. As he tries to pick up the pieces, he realizes it might be time to stop hiding behind his snarky opinions and start living his life—along with the people who have found their way into his heart.
Ben Philippe
Ben Philippe is a New York–based writer and screenwriter, born in Haiti and raised in Montreal, Canada. He has a Bachelor of Arts from Columbia University and an MFA in fiction and screenwriting from the Michener Center for Writers in Austin, Texas. He also teaches film studies and screenwriting at Barnard College. He is the author of the William C. Morris Award–winning novel The Field Guide to the North American Teenager. Find him online at www.benphilippe.com.
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Reviews for The Field Guide to the North American Teenager
133 ratings14 reviews
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Super cute teenage coming of age story! Hilarious and sweet.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Absolutely incredible. Quite possibly the best ya novel I've ever read, comparative to The Hate U Give and A Blade So Black.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Ben’s narrative voice always delivers in wit, humor, and insight. Familiar in structure and pacing his YA novels are comforting and also refreshing!
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Ok it was funny but I did not like the ending
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Norris has to do a lot of adjusting after his move from Canada to Texas. A Black French Canadian, he's a hockey player, a smart ass, and what he knows about Texas is limited to stereotypes and American high schools as portrayed in the media. He can't keep his mouth shut and his outsider stance is quickly flipped as he befriends a cheerleader and has her giving him advice to date the girl he sets his sights on, Aarty. It's funny, cringy, and an enjoyable read.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Evergreen Bk Award nominee 2022: Very snarky, humorous narrative of black Canadian teen traveling from Montreal, Canada (divorce, dad stays mom moves) going to Austin TX where his mom has new college teaching job. Lots of heart - year in the life sort of story.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Norris Kaplan moves from Canada to Austin, Texas because his mother has received a job offer at the University in Austin. At first, Norris is extremely reluctant to acclimate to the new school and prefers to spend time alone only looking forward to the vacation he has coming back up to Canada. Then through an act of bullying, Norris is defended by a bunch of Cheerleaders by Aarti with whom he immediately falls in love. Norris decides to take a job at a local BBQ restaurant to cover the cost of airfare as his mother and he is lower middle class and ends up working with the owners' daughter who is one of the cheerleaders, Madison. This is a feel-good story that reads like a classic 90's high school drama. I ADORED Norris as the main character. He was witty and sarcastic without being overbearing. One of the best main characters that I have ever read.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5I would like to read more of this author because there's a lot of clever-funny going on here. But I am mystified by the decision to write this in 3rd person when the narrative screams 1st.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Trigger Warnings: Underage drinking/drunkenness
After his mom gets a new job, Norris Kaplan, a black French Canadian, moves from Canada all the way down to Austin, Texas. Between starting a new high school and sweating through multiple black shirts a day, Norris begins writing down his observations of everyone around him in a notebook. After a while though, those labels become actual people to Norris and some he can even call friends. It all changes on the night of Prom when Norris screws it up, big time. He must figure out if he stays and tries to fix everything or get on the next flight back to Canada to live with his dad.
I couldn't stand Norris for about 90% of this book. He was presented as being this well behaved kid who didn't have many friends but then you get to know him and he's really just a jerk. At least he seems to know it though...
"... Norris was known to occasionally say something that left people wide-eyed and stunned. Or, in the worse cases, always accidental, genuinely hurt. Only afterward, in that awkward silence that would stretch from minutes to days, would he realize what had happened. Sometimes it came weeks later, when Norris would notice that a social media contact had unfriended him after some perceived slight he himself barely remembered. And at that point, it was better for everyone to just move on rather than go into flailing damage control for people who no longer wanted anything to do with him. After all, Norris couldn't control their feelings."
His Mom warns him quite a few times about watching his mouth and what he says. His friends even call him out on a few occasions.
"...Most people - heck, most living beings - have fight or flight as their two responses to crisis. You, Norris? You're a poker. You don't fight; you poke and then run away. I don't know why. Maybe so you can feel rightfully victimized?"
By the end of the book, Norris just never seemed to make any kind of effort to make things work or to actually change after all the callouts given to him. I tried to give him some benefit of the doubt as he is a teenager who has moved 1,000's of miles away from the only life he's ever known to a new country, but like... his judginess and self-righteousness never changed and it was frustrating! I'm not sure he learned any lessons other than to apologize.
The plot of the story is marketed as Norris moving from one country to the other and learning not to judge people based on stereotypes... but I would say it's also about taking responsibility for your life and actions as well. There's a few bits here and there where characters are struggling with doing what they want to do versus maybe what their parents are wanting. As well as characters who are falling into the mold of their stereotypes but for reasons other than just following the crowd.
Overall it fell into the contemporary high school YA novel I thought it would be. Although I really didn't like the main character, I still enjoyed the story told. - Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5Norris moves with his mom from Montreal to Austin, Texas and must try to survive the heat, the separation from his best friend, and most of all, navigating the Typical Texas Teenagers in his new school. It doesn't help that he's a black French Canadian or that his mouth is sometimes faster than his sense of tact.Part YA sweet romance, part coming-of-age, part #ownvoices narrative of a black teen in the modern-day South. I enjoyed this one immensely and think it definitely deserves this year's Morris Award. The characters were very well drawn: complex in their motivations and wants/needs and all easy to empathize with and root for and love. And although that too-precocious-for-a-teen element was present in the writing, it wasn't as bothersome as it is in other YA authors.
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5I read this novel at the request of a friend. She wanted an opinion on finding something to engage her teenager in the current news-media dialogue on racism. This book isn’t a good choice because it is more about a middle-school kid (Norris) trying to fit in at a new high school. Beyond that, the fact he is black, French-Canadian does not come across as the source of the drama that pervades this novel. In fact, there was too much high-school drama which didn’t convey an authentic situation. I was disappointed at the amount of stereotyping (jocks, cheer leaders, an introductory school counsellor). I’ve read a number of YA novels in the contemporary fiction genre and this one fell flat. Too busy being snarky and sarcastic, Norris didn’t come across as a realistic teen voice.
- Rating: 5 out of 5 stars5/5I can't remember the last time I laughed out loud so much while reading a book! I loved Norris' brand of sarcastic humor, and he's not afraid to direct it at himself either. He's so snarky and I just loved his entire demeanor - unlikable, but real... which made him likeable and relatable. Even his situation with this parents was relatable. I definitely felt that.
What I liked about the romance element of the book is how authentic it was, angst and all. Oh, and I don't want to spoil much, but the twist that was pulled... definitely saw it coming, and I was rooting for it too! I also have to say that I love the way the book ended, leaving an open door with major possibility. - Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Ben Philippe’s debut novel, The Field Guide to the North American Teenager, hits all the right buttons for a lot of YA readers: funny, romantic, quirky friends and topical social issues. Norris Kaplan finds himself unhappily moving from Montreal to Austin, Texas for his mother’s new job. He hates everything about his new life--the heat, the people, and the lack of hockey to name a few. The Field Guide follows Norris through his first half-yearn Texas and all of the typical high school drama he encounters while he tries not to fit in. Readers who like Becky Albertalli, Ned Vizzini and Chris Crutcher definitely have a new author to follow.
- Rating: 4 out of 5 stars4/5Norris is a fun and realistic protagonist who totally makes this book.