Peck's strength lies in his ability to create strong individual characters. By choosing Chelsea as the first-person narrator of the novel, he presents an honest storyteller, and a perfect one for easy reader identification. Having the entire story told through a flashback gives Chelsea the opportunity not only to relay experiences, but to understand the important effects they have on future events.

Peck uses musicians to convey period of the events, and this device works well: "Was it the Michael Jackson year or the Prince year? No, it was the Madonna year." Since Peck mentions well-known people who are still producing records, he does not set his book in two specific years, but lets the reader set the time frame. Peck also uses popular words to represent each year. During Chelsea's sophomore year "awesome" was the big word. "Sleaze" was popular during her junior year.

He...