Pontiac Solstice GXP – Review: Pontiac wasted no time making early adopters who bought a Solstice over sticker feel like they got ripped off. The new Pontiac Solstice GXP is the car they should've pined for, the car they should've waited for, the car they should've paid over sticker for. It's got the same great styling but includes a few refinement tweaks and a sweet new turbocharged engine that delivers the performance promised by the Pontiac's design. It's a flawed beauty to be sure, but like that crazy girlfriend in college, its fun factor trumps its personality quirks – for a little while, anyway.

To gauge the difference between the regular-strength Solstice and the new extra-strength Solstice GXP, we grabbed an Aggressive Red model with the standard five-speed manual transmission. To the $25,995 base price, which includes the $600 destination charge, our test car added leather seats, air conditioning (not standard, can you believe it?), OnStar, an upgraded Monsoon audio system, XM satellite radio an auxiliary input jack, a rear spoiler, and a premium acoustic headliner. The options ran $3,394, bringing the as-tested price to $29,389. The car spent part of our test week at a local Pontiac dealer because the trunk ajar warning chime wouldn't stop its incessant ding-ding-ding-ding-dinging, even when the trunk was solidly closed.

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