There's nothing more American than apple pie.
Except maybe Alex Kim, star of the new book Apple Pie by David Mazzotta.
Alex -- who is quick to assert he is not Korean just because he was born in Grosse Point, Mich. -- is not a genius and not a nerd. He's just an average engineering student attending the University of Michigan and living with three other engineers whom he calls "The Dweebs."
But Alex is not happy. He's ready to shrug off the expectations of his highly patriarchal Korean family to pursue the woman he loves, even if that means becoming an introspective and flighty philosophy major.
Apple Pie is laugh-out-loud funny, but not because of its absurdity. Instead, Mazzotta's description of the often-awkward college experience is related in a way that is both realistic and humorous.
Of course, Alex faces the obvious pressures of being a waiter, a son and a boyfriend. But he also must deal with universal college problems: oversleeping, failing tests and taking obscure classes like "Thematic Social Violence in Literature and Philosophy in the Modern Age."
According to the first-time writer, Alex's character was based on Mazzotta's own college friends.
"Most of them were nothing like the typical stereotype (of Asian students). They just wanted to drink beer and play video games," Mazzotta said in an interview. "That experience played in well with the theme of searching for identity against the expectation of others."
Apple Pie (which should have alternately been titled Alex Kim's Excellent Adventure) is a must-read for any student who has questioned his major, his love life, his career plans or his friendships.
"The idea is that when many people leave for college, they think they have an idea of what direction they are going," Mazzotta said. "In time that changes, but the inertia of the expectations of friends and family work against your development. (Alex) escapes it when he realizes it's okay not to have a direction. That's when he stops listening to others."
In all, Mazzotta has written a book that is as endearing as it is funny, as American as apple pie.
Grade: A-
