Review - The Disreputable History of Frankie Landau-Banks

Published by Hyperion
Published 28 May 2008

Summary from Goodreads - 

Frankie Landau-Banks at age 14: 
Debate Club.
Her father’s “bunny rabbit.”
A mildly geeky girl attending a highly competitive boarding school.

Frankie Landau-Banks at age 15:
A knockout figure.
A sharp tongue.
A chip on her shoulder.
And a gorgeous new senior boyfriend: the supremely goofy, word-obsessed Matthew Livingston.

Frankie Laundau-Banks.
No longer the kind of girl to take “no” for an answer.
Especially when “no” means she’s excluded from her boyfriend’s all-male secret society.
Not when her ex boyfriend shows up in the strangest of places.
Not when she knows she’s smarter than any of them.
When she knows Matthew’s lying to her.
And when there are so many, many pranks to be done.

Frankie Landau-Banks, at age 16:
Possibly a criminal mastermind.

This is the story of how she got that way.

I have a confession.  I did what bloggers are not supposed to do.  I googled the book and read bad reviews of this book.  *gasp* I know, sue me.  See the thing is, no one has ever recommended this book to me, I've never heard anyone talking about this book or telling me why I needed to read it.  Stuff like this makes me curious, because I know people know who E Lockhart is, and I know a lot of people love the Ruby Oliver series.  So why the radio silence on this book.  Was it that it this book was so horrid and would damage my corneas by just reading the filth of the pages, or was it that this book was quite possibly so amazing, they didn't want anyone else to discover it, like they were hatching some plan to keep Frankie under wraps so they could keep her all to themsleves.  Or maybe, I was so woefully, ignorantly out of the loop through my own fault.

I would like to start the shennanigans by stating that Frankie Landau-Banks might just be one of my favourite heronies.  Not only is she so kick ass she could probably knock the karate kid down a notch, but she makes up words for fun.  For fun. Now, most of you don't know me personally, but making up words is one of my favourite past times, like pretending to be able to speak forgein languages and dancing in front of the mirror with my remote.  Plus, she is this crazy insane mastermind, I even think if she put her immensely clever mind to it, she could probably plot world domination and not even get caught.  I can't even steal glances at people without getting caught.  

So Frankie goes to this ultra posh boarding school also known as Albaster Prep School, this year she is hot and seems to have grown quite an impressive rack over the summer, which of course means that when she goes back to school as a Sophomore, she is the prime piece of arm candy for the hottest guy in school.  The hottest guy in school is also called Matthew, though, Alpha was most definately my favourite.  1, he was blond, 2, he was actually cleverer than he let on, and disguised intelligance makes me feel kind of sweaty.  Him and his friends are part of this secret society called The Loyal Order of the Basset Hounds, not that Frankie is supposed to know about this, but go with it, (she's like a spy with fashion sense!) Not only does Matthew not tell Frankie about his secret boys only club, but her tries to start bossing her around, which does not go down well with Frankie.  

Now, any other girl would just accept that her boyfriend had this boy club and not actually care that she was never invited to join or let into the camerarderie of it all, which even she admits, is the thing she cares about most of all.  Not Frankie.  Sick and tired of feeling underestimated and unworthy, all because she owns a pair of boobs, Frankie fights back.  I will say it now, girl power is one of the best kinds of power.  Sticking it to the Man, she infiltrates the group, masquerading as one of their own and commands them to pull a series of well thought out, insanely clever pranks.  Shes like a puppet master pulling their little boy strings and making them do whatever she asks, without them even knowing it was her.  If that is not pure love rolled up into a mastermind sneaky troublesome feminist, then I dont know what is.  

My favourite thing was that although she loved hanging with Matthew and his friends, Frankie was never scared of saying what she thought, she wouldn't fade into the shadows of their exclusivity, she was her own person dammit and she wanted them to see her for the person she was, rather the person she was with.  Social order could suck it as far as Frankie was concerned, who cared that the club had been only open to males since it originated, wasn't this the 21st century, where women were now classed as equals to men.  They had the right to vote, so why not the right to join some crummy club a bunch of grodie boys were running into the ground.  

Conformity is never something i've been comfortable with, I don't like to be told what to do and I hate being undermined by people.  Its rude and unneccesary, so when Frankie basically give them all the finger and was like "screw you, i'm going to do what I want, and none of you nimwits can stop me, because i've got more brains in my big toe than you've got in that delicious head of yours" (shes talking to Alpha or Matthew here I suspect) I nearly broke out the awesome dance.  Like, if I could've put the book down for one second, the dance would've been danced.  This book made me question everything, it made me realise that young adult literature needs more fiesty kick ass girls, girls who can outsmart boys headed to Harvard.

This is a book that makes me happy I read YA, it was witty, intelligent, and a genius new spin on feminisim and how fighting back against the social order is something each and everyone of us should try sometime, even if its some lame ass unspoken rule.  So next time i'm on the bus i'm going to talk to myself and not care that people think i'm crazy, i'll just be sticking it to the Man.  Brilliant, one of the best books i've read this year.