My Most Excellent Year, Many More to Come

By Amber McGee

Courier Staff Columnist

As the last day of school draws near now is the time for reflection. When thinking back to this year, whether it be your freshman, sophomore, junior, or senior, consider the positives and negatives. After overlooking all the major events, and even a few of the smaller ones, consider where this year would rank on a scale from the worst ever to the best ever. Ask yourself if there was anything you would change or anything you wouldn’t change for the world.

Ask yourself, was this My Most Excellent Year?

If you answered yes, then congratulations! You found this year on par with T.C, Augie, and Alejandra’s freshman year of highschool. The year where they made new friends, discovered more about themselves, and caught the oh so troublesome love bug. They also met Julie Andrews, ended up adopting a kid, and restored a baseball diamond at an old Japanese internment camp, but that all comes later. First our quirky and lost characters must navigate the trials and tribulations of their first talent show.

Told through diary entries, emails, memos, and even newspaper clippings, the journey of T.C and his buddies through their first year of highschool is an entertaining, heartwarming, and overwhelmingly positive story. This book is so full of warm feelings that even self proclaimed pessimists won’t be able to help but smile at least once. Part of what makes this book great is that the narrative isn’t restricted solely to the kids–yes, even those adults we call parents, whom almost always seem to be either dead or absent in most young adult novels, get a chance in the spotlight. Who said that romance was only for the young ones?

Of the three main characters it can be said that T.C Keller is the lead. He is Augie’s brother, in spirit, and the boy who has fallen head over heels for Alejandra. It is through him that the story of My Most Excellent Year comes alive. T.C is your “average joe” character, that is, if the average joe has a family obsessed with the Red Sox’s and a father who will build life size science projects for them.

T.C’s soul brother, Augie Hwong, is another eccentric character. For those who have watched Glee for even five minutes, he’s essentially an asian Kurt Hummel. Augie knew Broadway before he knew how to walk. Unfortunately for him, he doesn’t realize he’s gay until it pretty much hits him in the face. Everyone else knows–because of course men liking Broadway instantly makes them gay–but he doesn’t. This part of Augie’s arc is the only real down vote I had with the story. The “gay-but-doesn’t-know-it-but-everyone-else-does” trope is what ruined the ending of Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe for me. Luckily Steve Kluger heard my very loud prayers, and after about fifty pages in the trope is dropped.

Alejandra Perez on the other hand is someone who rarely drops anything. The daughter of the Mexican ambassador to the United States, by the time the book has started she’s insulted and accidentally offended about 10 different nations. Though she has no interest for a future in politics, she is interested in political justice. As T.C soon finds out, if she believes in something she will defend it to her last breath. Everything except her secret passion for dancing and singing that is. No matter how great Augie tells her she is Alejandra is determined to keep her parents happy by pretending to be interested in elite gatherings and silent Thanksgivings.

Belief will occasionally have to be suspended when reading this book (everyone’s inner pessimist screams, is it even possible for people to be so cheerful all the time?), but that’s ok. My Most Excellent Year is nothing close to a fantasy. It’s a slice of life novel, a coming of age story that has just enough of a dust of magic to expose how fun the real world could be if we just gave it a chance. Nothing sums up the positive, hopeful tone of the novel more than it’s last words.

“Never, ever stop believing in magic, no matter how old you get. Because if you keep looking long enough and don’t give up, sooner or later you’re going to find Mary Poppins.” Or Harry Potter, or Beyonce. No matter who you replace the name with, if you look up to them, the quote will work it’s magic. Believe that you can go far and you will. Believe that you can make tomorrow better and you will.

Take the world by storm, and make it your goal to have this year, the next, or maybe even a year in the far future, be your most excellent year.