Because I just finished reading Eleanor and Park.
And WOW. That book brought back all those torrents of Feelings from high school. John Green is right up there with Rainbow Rowell. When I read An Abundance of Katherines, I grinned the whole way through because I felt like I was eavesdropping on the clever nerds I hung out with in high school. There were plenty of nerdy kids in my high school who weren't clever, just out of the social swing of things. John Green's nerds are very, very clever.
Both those authors nail the high school voice. And I'm sure there are others who do, as well. I'm thinking of Stephanie Perkins--her contemporary books don't remind me a bit of my own high school experience, but they're great stories. But mostly, I kind of find contemporary settings . . . boring. When I sit down to read, I want something more magical and fantastic than high school or part-time jobs. I want time travel messing with the universe's fabric or historical settings with perfect details or a murder mystery to solve or some kind of mythological something coming true.
It's quite a feat for a contemporary novel to blow me away. I'm blown.
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