Review: Virgin by Radhika Sanghani

[dropcap]E[/dropcap]llie Kolstakis is a twenty-one-year-old English literature student, and a virgin. Until her doctor offers her an STI test, Ellie’s never considered her lack of sexual prowess to be a problem. But now she’s on a mission to pop her cherry before graduation, with the help of friends Lara, Emma, and newly-out-of-the-closet Paul. Needless to say, her quest to de-virginize herself doesn’t quite go to plan, especially when she meets Jack, a good-looking master of mixed messages.

One thing which can be said about this book is that it feels authentic. Lots of Ellie’s mishaps, whilst funny, seem like they could actually happen to a real, twenty-first century student. Radhika Sanghani has a good ear for dialogue, and the way Ellie and her companions speak genuinely reminded me of late-night chats I’ve had with my own friends. Despite this, I did sometimes feel that Ellie’s voice sounded a bit childish and obvious:

“Surely cheating could involve snogging, right? Why did EVERYTHING have to be about sex?”

I liked the fact that the book didn’t look down on its protagonist. Ellie is hapless, self-absorbed, and somewhat shallow, but I think a lot of girls will relate to her battles with body insecurities and dealing with flaky boys.

However, there are times when Ellie’s self-obsession take her into completely unlikable territory.

When Paul, a boy she barely knows, reveals that he’s gay, Ellie’s immediate reaction is to ask whether they can go shopping together because she’s “always wanted a gay best friend”. The fact that she totally ignores Paul’s anxieties made her seem selfish beyond belief, and I cannot believe that a twenty-one-year-old lit student wouldn’t have a better understanding of and sensitivity to homosexuality.

Although Ellie doesn’t focus only on herself, she still spends the vast majority of her life concentrating on who might or might not want to pork her, which gets a little trite. To be fair to the character, she does spend some time thinking about her career and applying for internships (ah, the joys), but it is a bit wearing to hear a twenty-first century young woman pay more attention to whether or not a boy’s texted her back than to her grades.

Ellie does learn her lesson (sort of) by the end of the book, but the section where Ellie rhapsodises about self-respect and independence, whilst completely legitimate, feels somewhat forced, and about as subtle as an anvil dropping. It’s not that I didn’t agree wholeheartedly with what she was saying, but a more subtle approach was definitely needed.

Most of the supporting characters were broadly, but often quite effectively, drawn. Ellie’s filthy-mouthed friends were fun, and it was nice to see the book spend time developing the female friendships rather than using them as an excuse for discussion about boys. Jack, the slightly pretentious boy Ellie gets involved with, was also a well-drawn and believable character.

Ellie’s overprotective Greek mother was hilarious, if inconsistently written. On one page she’d be begging Ellie to exploit her assets to secure a boyfriend, and on the next she would be forbidding Ellie to have anything to do with men. This hypocrisy could have worked, but needed more careful handling than it was paid by the book.

Despite its flaws, Virgin is an enjoyable book and succeeds at what it sets out to do: handle the issues and anxieties of young women in a frank, feisty manner.

It’s not for everyone, and I definitely wouldn’t recommend the book to those who are squicky about sex or (particularly) the female body. But for everybody else, Sanghani’s book makes for readable and nastily addictive entertainment, whether you’re a virgin or not.

Image Credits: Header (Flickr/János Balázs), Image 1 (radhikasanghani.com).