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What Really Happened to the Class of '93: Start-ups, Dropouts, and Other Navigations Through an Untidy Decade
The homecoming queen, the teen mom, the scientist, the wallflower, the flirt, the discipline case, and the homophobe—how did a decade marked by impeachment, a dot-com bubble, 9/11, and war shake their lives?
The Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology’s class of '93 graduated into an era of unprecedented optimism. The Soviet Union had collapsed, Clinton was pre-Monica, and rumors were spreading about a thing called the Internet. For young people stepping out into the world for the first time, America hummed with promise. Just ten years later, that promise has collapsed into uncertainty, and the class of '93—nearly in their thirties now—finds itself struggling to make sense of all that's happened.
In the year leading up to his ten-year reunion, journalist Chris Colin tracked down his former classmates and asked them to pull back the curtains on their lives. Sometimes what he discovered was a swath of American history, other times simply frank and arresting accounts of how people fall in love, or steady their nerves on hills in Kosovo, or fall on their knees before God, or find out biology had handed them the wrong gender, and otherwise lurch into adulthood. And when the Thomas Jefferson class of '93 finally reconvenes for the reunion itself —after the very core of their country seems to have been shaken—Colin finds that maybe he and his classmates never left high school behind in the first place.
For all that's been said about the dramatic years straddling the turn of the twenty-first century, little has been observed about those who actually came of age in that time. For the Class of '93, unbridled optimism gave way to bewilderment, peace to war, and happiness sometimes to tragedy. From these stories emerges a picture of an era and the intensely candid story of a few lives taking shape in the midst of it.
The Thomas Jefferson High School for Science and Technology’s class of '93 graduated into an era of unprecedented optimism. The Soviet Union had collapsed, Clinton was pre-Monica, and rumors were spreading about a thing called the Internet. For young people stepping out into the world for the first time, America hummed with promise. Just ten years later, that promise has collapsed into uncertainty, and the class of '93—nearly in their thirties now—finds itself struggling to make sense of all that's happened.
In the year leading up to his ten-year reunion, journalist Chris Colin tracked down his former classmates and asked them to pull back the curtains on their lives. Sometimes what he discovered was a swath of American history, other times simply frank and arresting accounts of how people fall in love, or steady their nerves on hills in Kosovo, or fall on their knees before God, or find out biology had handed them the wrong gender, and otherwise lurch into adulthood. And when the Thomas Jefferson class of '93 finally reconvenes for the reunion itself —after the very core of their country seems to have been shaken—Colin finds that maybe he and his classmates never left high school behind in the first place.
For all that's been said about the dramatic years straddling the turn of the twenty-first century, little has been observed about those who actually came of age in that time. For the Class of '93, unbridled optimism gave way to bewilderment, peace to war, and happiness sometimes to tragedy. From these stories emerges a picture of an era and the intensely candid story of a few lives taking shape in the midst of it.
- GenresNonfictionAdult
304 pages, Hardcover
First published May 11, 2004
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Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews
March 24, 2007
They were all gay. All of them. Except the author. That's what "really" happened to the class of '93. Seriously.
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May 12, 2008Boy, was this a disappointment. I read good reviews of this a few years back and it has been lingering on my Amazon wish list since then; I just got it as part of the aforementioned and very exciting big box from the Strand.
It was just so small. That would not have been a huge problem if it weren't for his predilection for declaring his classmates representative of their entire generation. They are not nearly as diverse, or as interesting, as he seems to think. Worse, his writing about them is poor; his analysis seems disconnected from their quotes, and in some cases outright biased by his own perspectives. He might have done better if he had tried to do a journalistic portrait of someone else's class, or positioned this as a personal journey of his reconnection with a number of classmates. He hit somewhere in the middle of those two, and it's just a train wreck. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who didn't go to high school with the author.
It was just so small. That would not have been a huge problem if it weren't for his predilection for declaring his classmates representative of their entire generation. They are not nearly as diverse, or as interesting, as he seems to think. Worse, his writing about them is poor; his analysis seems disconnected from their quotes, and in some cases outright biased by his own perspectives. He might have done better if he had tried to do a journalistic portrait of someone else's class, or positioned this as a personal journey of his reconnection with a number of classmates. He hit somewhere in the middle of those two, and it's just a train wreck. I wouldn't recommend it to anyone who didn't go to high school with the author.
August 30, 2018
This is a book for when you're feeling nostalgic, particularly if any of your formative years were during this time. I graduated in 2006 so I'm a bit younger than I expect the intended reader is but it was still an interesting read. It alternates between specific classmates' experiences and general thoughts provided by the author - for example, the affect of 9/11.
Overall, this book never quite lands the emotional, thoughtful punch I think it's going for. It's mostly fluff and touches on some harder subjects but seems almost to veer off every time we get to some real meat. His former ex-girlfriend, who is black, talks about the exhausting effort it takes educating white people and his response is a bit guarded and confused. He acknowledges the issue but still talks about how perceptions can be different a chapter or so later in a what that comes off as somewhat dismissive. One of the biggest issues I hoped he could have handled better was the chapter in which a former classmate has transitioned to a different gender. The author continues to refer to the pre-trans/high school person he knew with the wrong pronouns and name, which I can imagine many trans individuals will be upset by (and rightfully so - don't deadname anyone!).
What Really Happened to the Class of '93? Honestly, nothing that surprising. Some of the weirdos and freaks settled down, the bully learned to handle his emotions better, the busy over-achiever continues to overachieve - exactly the way most high school graduates do, regardless of whatever year they graduate.
Overall, this book never quite lands the emotional, thoughtful punch I think it's going for. It's mostly fluff and touches on some harder subjects but seems almost to veer off every time we get to some real meat. His former ex-girlfriend, who is black, talks about the exhausting effort it takes educating white people and his response is a bit guarded and confused. He acknowledges the issue but still talks about how perceptions can be different a chapter or so later in a what that comes off as somewhat dismissive. One of the biggest issues I hoped he could have handled better was the chapter in which a former classmate has transitioned to a different gender. The author continues to refer to the pre-trans/high school person he knew with the wrong pronouns and name, which I can imagine many trans individuals will be upset by (and rightfully so - don't deadname anyone!).
What Really Happened to the Class of '93? Honestly, nothing that surprising. Some of the weirdos and freaks settled down, the bully learned to handle his emotions better, the busy over-achiever continues to overachieve - exactly the way most high school graduates do, regardless of whatever year they graduate.
January 23, 2025
They all ended up being pretty average to below average people
October 16, 2010
10-year reunion of class of '93 at the science magnet HS, Thomas Jefferson, in northern VA. Author collects some poignant stories (e.g., two classmates who had killed themselves) and a few people who had made major changes, but for the most part it was just unremarkable stuff you would expect with maturation in this age range -- the guy who used to get in lots of fights now doesn't get in so many fights, etc. The cohort-based commentary was also fairly uninsightful (9/11 changed everything; dot com boom didn't last......).
I like the idea of catching up with one's old classmates, but on the evidence of this book it should either be taken up by a better writer or perhaps wait a little longer -- maybe 25th reunion book would be more interesting.
I like the idea of catching up with one's old classmates, but on the evidence of this book it should either be taken up by a better writer or perhaps wait a little longer -- maybe 25th reunion book would be more interesting.
April 5, 2007
it's not any kind of sociology, but rather one guy decides to look up some of his classmates 10 years after high school and see how they're doing. You can't really draw any conclusions from it, but it did give me hope that maybe my own graduating class isn't too bad off.
May 10, 2007
Since I graduated in 1994 I was intrigued by this look back at what has happened since. It's amazing how life takes paths we never thought it would while we were invincible.
January 15, 2009
Doug stole my review
December 8, 2008
I picked this up because I liked the 1965 version however I didn't find this one nearly as interesting, perhaps because the time period is my own.
October 16, 2009
This book is different than what I originally imagined.
Displaying 1 - 10 of 10 reviews