Jennifer Niven’s book, The Aqua Net Diaries, has just been released. My interest is that it was written by a woman, Jennifer Niven (nom de plume of Jennifer McJunkin) a couple of years ahead of me at Richmond High School in the 1980s. It’s a memoir of her days at Richmond.
The Palladium-Item has a write up by Rachel Sheeley. Apparently Jennifer’s buddy Joe Kraemer figures prominently in the story. Joe’s brother was one of my sister’s best friends.
Now, as luck would have it, I have warm memories of Jennifer and Joe who were, I believe, seniors, when I was a freshman on the school’s speech team. As I recall, I wasn’t any good on the speech team at the time, but they were awfully nice to me anyway. I don’t suppose they have any particular memory of that – mighty seniors make a greater impact on lowly freshmen than the reverse.
So, it’s great to see some hometown kids making good – particularly when they were (so far as I knew anyway) good kids who treated people well.
That’s my long way of encouraging anyone with interest in such things to pick up a copy of the book.
She’s working on a TV series based on the book. Could our Doug be that wallflower character over in the corner of the Speech Club scenes? Suggestions for casting might be in order?
My big break: Faceless Nerd #3!
I literally was the “boy next door….” I keep teasing her she needs Matt Damon to play me!
Sounds like a good book.
Apparently Ms. Niven was a couple of years ahead of my younger sister, but my sis does not remember Ms. Niven, even by her original name. Supposedly Charlie Sheen and Emilio Estevez are involved with the possible TV production. I thought that was strange, until I remembered that Martin Sheen is originally from Dayton, Ohio.
I hope that Ms. Niven’s book and TV show are successful.
I probably won ‘t read the book, but it was a nice post to read, and edifying when someone remembers to say positive things about people. Maybe especially about high school. Makes me want to do the same. Let’s pass it on or spread it around or something. A kind friend recently reconnected me with an old acquaintance that I had lost touch with. I will let her know I appreciate it.
I just finished reading the book today. It’s a quick read and I really enjoyed it. I would recommend it to anyone seeking out a light, fun, but not trivialized look at high school life in the 80s, especially in Richmond, Indiana. Like Doug, I graduated from RHS in ’89, and unlike many others, it seems like I lived under a rock for much of high school. Lots of Niven’s book rang really true, and the rest was like visiting a place that looked familiar and that I should have known better than I did. Also: it’s quite odd that people you actually know are characters in a book, but that’s a huge amount of the fun.
I’ll have to give it a read. Jennifer lived next door. We hung out some during the years before high school.
Like Emily, I kind of lived under a rock, at least after school.
The late 80’s were a pretty charmed time to grow up in Richmond. It will be good to read about it and relive some of it again.