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Title: The Moth Diaries
Author: Rachel Klein
Published: Washington, D.C.: Counterpoint, 2002
Rating: 5 of 5
Page Count: 250
Total Page Count: 144,831
Text Number: 425
Read Because: enjoyed the film adaptation, borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: Rebecca is eager to begin a new year at boarding school with her best friend as a roommate, but the strange student who moves in across the hall threatens to destroy everything. The Moth Diaries has been adapted into an atmospheric but sometimes unsuccessful film, which is how I discovered it; as it turns out, the film was a faithful adaptation but the story works better as a novel. What makes it succeed is its subjectivity: as a diarist, Rebecca is beautifully characterized—an erudite, bitterly selfish, sympathetic, and distinctly teenage young woman—and a consummate unreliable narrator; the war between her certainty and her strange, unsubstantiated experiences creates sense of unease which is foiled by the school's beguiling, isolated atmosphere. The Moth Diaries is romantic but unromanticized, with a littering of literary references, frequently unlikable narrator, and dreamlike atmosphere which overlays a school rendered in both enchanting and banal detail. I found it to be an unqualified success, and if the premise appeals then I recommend it enthusiastically.
Author: Rachel Klein
Published: Washington, D.C.: Counterpoint, 2002
Rating: 5 of 5
Page Count: 250
Total Page Count: 144,831
Text Number: 425
Read Because: enjoyed the film adaptation, borrowed from the Multnomah County Library
Review: Rebecca is eager to begin a new year at boarding school with her best friend as a roommate, but the strange student who moves in across the hall threatens to destroy everything. The Moth Diaries has been adapted into an atmospheric but sometimes unsuccessful film, which is how I discovered it; as it turns out, the film was a faithful adaptation but the story works better as a novel. What makes it succeed is its subjectivity: as a diarist, Rebecca is beautifully characterized—an erudite, bitterly selfish, sympathetic, and distinctly teenage young woman—and a consummate unreliable narrator; the war between her certainty and her strange, unsubstantiated experiences creates sense of unease which is foiled by the school's beguiling, isolated atmosphere. The Moth Diaries is romantic but unromanticized, with a littering of literary references, frequently unlikable narrator, and dreamlike atmosphere which overlays a school rendered in both enchanting and banal detail. I found it to be an unqualified success, and if the premise appeals then I recommend it enthusiastically.
