Adorable. Mallory is an 11th grade girl that finds out her boyfriend is cheating on her via social networking. Drama ensues, and Mallory swears off all things modern and decides things were better in 1962, when her grandmother was a junior in high school.

The story is from the POV of Mallory, so the characters are as Mallory sees them and Leavitt still gives them enough depth to make them interesting (well, except for Jeremy, but he's a tool).
Mallory could be any teenage girl, I thought of her as Tessa from Suburgatory.
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Cutesey and strangely glossed over in parts.
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A teen book without a love triangle! Mostly, I guess. Mallory finds out her boyfriend is cheating on her, dumps him in a spectacularly public manner, and then takes a moratorium on all things technology related. I'm a little tired of the "oh the '60s were a simpler time so I should act like I'm in the '60s" schtick, but as Mallory is only 16 I guess I can forgive the naivete. Now that I'm actually thinking about it, I can't seem to remember a lot actually HAPPENING in this book, but I thought it was a fairly decent snapshot of a few days in an adolescent's life. The whole subplot with the grandma having gotten pregnant in high school and giving up the baby for adoption felt like a contrived way of illustrating how the '60s WEREN'T that innocent. It also felt too rushed and or underdeveloped. However, those are minor sticking points. Overall I really enjoyed this. ( )

I found this difficult to get into, perhaps because I didn't realise it was a teen book until I started it. It became more engaging as it went on. It's a nice, light read. It's not as profound as it could have been, however. ( )

I was initially drawn to this YA book because of its title. Vintage is something I like to shop, buy, and hold on to, so the story's premise intrigued me. Mallory, a junior in high school, swears off all technology and breaks with her over-a-year boyfriend, Jeremy, after discovering (by cyber snooping) that he has an avatar wife in a computer game and that Jeremy's inbox is filled with his cyber wife's messages. The very next day Mallory -- while helping her father pack up Grandma Vivian's house because the widow has recently moved to a retirement community -- finds an old notebook of Grandma Vivian's that contains a five-item to-do list from 1962 when Vivian started her junior year in high school. With # 1 on the list being "Run for pep squad secretary" Mallory's mission of trying to live as if back in the early '60s commences. But Mallory's school has no pep squad and so she must start one. Naturally, this brings on complications.

The story unfolds with such humor early on that I expected it to be all light and breezy about teen angst. I admit to being mistaken in thinking that the book's title and premise would make it just one of those fun and entertaining YA reads. It was so much more. Mallory's sister, Ginnie, her Grandma Vivian, her new friend, Oliver, and Mallory's parents too, are all richly drawn supporting characters. And I have a fondness for a humorous story that has hidden serious layers. Plus, this book so skillfully shows how easy it is to mistake a past era as a simpler time when comparing it with today's technology-driven world. Suffering a broken heart, searching for self-identity, makes GOING VINTAGE, with all its layers, one exceptional read. ( )