In her first book, Easy, author Kerry Cohen painted a cautionary tale of a teenage girl desperately trying to find acceptance by exploiting her burgeoning teenage sexuality.In her second book, the autobiographical 'Loose Girl,' Cohen reveals that much of her first novel was based on her own experiences growing up as an 'easy' girl.
Loose Girl is a beautifully written, uncomfortably candid memoir of adolescence in 80's and 90's New Jersey. Kerry Cohen explains how she first came to recognize the power her body had on men at a young age - and then goes on to describe how she first exploited this power and then untimately became consumed by it - all in an attempt to find the attention she so desperately craved.
Cohen is a master with the written word. Loose Girl is tautly paced, but still expressive and emotional. Given the right story - a fictional one - I think Kerry Cohen could quickly become one of the most dynamic authors of the decade.
But while her writing is pitch-perfect, the actual 'story' of Loose Girl is ultimately as unsatisfying as the one-night stands Kerry Cohen describes within it's pages.
The problem? Well, to be honest, it reads like a 224 page plea for attention. Throughout her teenage years, Kerry describes her attempts to win male attention by using her sexuality. This book, with it's rather cold and shameful litany of sexual misadventures, seems to be the literary equivalent of those adolescent fumblings.
"Read me!" The book screams. "I'm filled with illicit sexual promise!"
But turn the pages and instead of lurid language, you discover a dry list of unsatisfactory couplings stemming from Kerry Cohen's constant, burning need to be 'loved.'
She blames it on her mother, who left them to study medicine abroad. She blames it on her father, who'd rather smoke pot with her teenage friends than tell them off. The book seems to cry out for people to tell Cohen: 'There, there. It's not your fault you did these terrible things...'
Except the 'things' Cohen did aren't even considered all that terrible in today's day and age. With teenage sexuality rammed down our throat by One Tree Hill, the O.C. and even the latest Abercrombie and Fitch catalogues, what would have been a 'loose girl' in Cohen's day might just be a regular 'girl' in 2008.
From discussing it with female friends, I think many women would find a lot of interesting parallels between their experiences and those of Kerry Cohen. As a male reader, I might be missing the point somewhat.
Ultimately, I found Loose Girl to be just a little too introspective and self important to really hold my interest - but I could see the quality of Cohen's writing shine through and I will be interested to see what this promising author turns her talents to next.
Loose Girl is set for release in June 2008.
