Half His Age by Jennette McCurdy
on January 20, 2026
Genres: Fiction / Romance / Contemporary
Pages: 288
Format: Hardcover
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Waldo is ravenous. Horny. Blunt. Naive. Wise. Impulsive. Lonely. Angry. Forceful. Hurting. Perceptive. Endlessly wanting. And the thing she wants most of all: Mr. Korgy, her creative writing teacher with the wife and the kid and the mortgage and the bills, with the dead dreams and the atrophied looks and the growing paunch. She doesn’t know why she wants him. Is it his passion? His life experience? The fact that he knows books and films and things that she doesn’t? Or is it purer than that, rooted in their unlikely connection, their kindred spirits, the similar filter with which they each take in the world around them? Or, perhaps, it’s just enough that he sees her when no one else does.
Half His Age is vulgar. It’s bold, piercing, poignant. McCurdy has created something uncomfortably evocative. She really does not let us doubt for a moment what’s happening to Waldo, and yet she manages to balance that with some really careful nuance and characterization that reveals so much if you take the time to notice it.
It’s so refreshing to have one of these books where the girl isn’t a perfect victim: Waldo’s unlikeable; she’s self-centered in a way you’d call narcissistic if she were an adult. She judges everyone around her; she over-consumes; she’s sexually aggressive; she actively pursues this balding married man, her teacher, from day one. Yet she doubts herself implicitly; buys makeup and clothes in excess to feel something, wants to shape herself into everything she thinks others want her to be. She is ashamed of her upbringing, she self-deprecates by calling herself white trash before others can make the comment themselves. She’s a walking contradiction in clothes she hates and makeup that doesn’t match her face — exactly as a 17 year old girl would be! I almost hated her, yet wanted so badly to give her a hug and give her the advice and care she clearly never received from her Mother.
I don’t necessarily think this is a perfect book, but with the way I kept wanting to scream at the characters and throw it at the wall it feels wrong not to give it almost five stars. So I have rated it 4.5. This could obviously be quite triggering for some, but if you can handle the subject matter I absolutely recommend it.
English (US) · 