Be More Chill
By Ned Vizzini
Performed by Jesse Eisenberg

       90% of the human population has been made an outcast at least once during their tumultuous trip through the public or private school system. Jeremy Heere is one of those kids. He’s an out-and-out dork, which wouldn’t bother him as much if it wasn’t for the fact that he’s in love with one of the most popular girls in school. It doesn’t help his image when people find out that he’s kept track of his humiliations and has been rating them on his daily humiliation sheets, perfected by years of being the wrong person in the wrong place at the wrong time for the majority of his school life. Jeremy begins to realize that this is his fate and wonders if it could ever get better…then he hears about the “squip.” The “squip” is a quantum computer that is so small that it fits into a pill. Once taken, this super computer can make it’s way to your brain, access data that is stored there, and become the voice in your head that tells you exactly what to do to make the situation beneficial for you. After stealing some beanie babies from his dreaded aunt in order to sell them on eBay to get the cash to buy one, and going to the back of a Payless Shoe Store, Jeremy finally gets his hands on the almost microscopic technological miracle pill that will change his life forever and finally get him what he wants: a chance to impress Christine, the girl of his dreams. There’s just one problem; now that Jeremy’s got the squip, not everything goes the way he had planned. In fact, having that artificial intelligence in his brain ends up taking him on a road he never thought existed--a road that has more cliffs than Dover.

       This is an interesting tale of acceptance and the absurd hierarchy that has plagued the outcasts of the high school “social monarchy” since time and memorial. The language bothered me in the beginning because of the overuse of some of the more vulgar words and phrases that are floating around now-a-days, but as the story progressed, I eventually found the path that Vizzini was trying to point to in the beginning. It’s slow-moving until the squip gets involved, but after the computer begins to have its say, all hell breaks loose, and the sarcastic humor that I’ve come to love from being considered a “social reject” for most of my school days comes out in full force. The wittiness of the Keanu Reeves-voiced super computer and Jeremy, as they learn more about each other and the world around them, is absolutely divine. It’s not a book for teenagers as much as it is for young adults or college students who had once been in Jeremy’s statistical position in school.

       Jesse Eisenberg was the perfect pick to read this book. His sarcastic tone as he drones about the social structure of his high school blends perfectly with the tone that Vizzini does his best to bring out. He’s been in such movies as “The Emperor’s Club” and “Cursed.”