MixedLos Angeles Review of BooksI went into this novel ready and willing to be educated, you might say. But My Education left me more frustrated than enlightened. I found it lacking in the kind of depth necessary to impart wisdom. And aside from one exciting narrative thread we get to indulge in early on, it also suffers from a shortage of what should be its most vital, or at least its most enticing, element: sex appeal ... Choi is at her best in fashioning Brodeur, the elusive, brilliant academic with an ’80s bad boy edge and a blue blood twist, and his wife, Martha ... And then comes the plot twist, an impressive, totally unexpected little turn that shifts the story’s course entirely and is by far My Education’s most satisfying moment ... And once it ends, things take a dive. Not only for Regina, but for the novel as a whole ... If this book were able to glory in its raciness, perhaps the heavy-handed phrase here or there would be less offensive ... My Education’s main problem: Regina herself. Not only does her voice as narrator never really develop, there is also a lot missing about who she is, on a basic getting-to-know-you level. One gets the impression that Regina’s characterization is an oversight on Choi’s part, a case of the writer knowing this person so well in her mind that she fails to paint an adequate picture for the reader ... My Education did not deliver, leaving me not only neutral on the erotic front but glaringly unenlightened, above all.
