This book is full of light-hearted, fun and interesting characters. Anna has achieved fame because her father, a writer, is engaged to the world’s most famous actress. Like most teenage girls Anna cares what people think of her and she is dreading going back to school. Someone took a photo of her falling, bottom first, into a plant pot at her father’s engagement party and the photo has gone viral, looked at by over two million people. Anna is also concerned that the boy she likes is paying more attention to a new girl who shares his interest in art.
Anna shares her anxieties with her best friend Jess, but I got the feeling that Jess is not quite the loyal friend that Anna needs. She is trying to find something at which she can excel so that the plant pot incident will fade into people’s memories. A fellow student tells her that he will train her to be an athlete so that she can lead her school team the Penguins to victory over the opposing team the Eagles, but Anna is no athlete and the training almost finishes her off.
The dynamics of the friendship groups make a great read as do the antics of Anna’s future step mother as she prepares for the wedding. She wants absolutely everything to be over the top and I kept waiting for Anna’s Dad to dump her. She reminded me of something I read ages ago said by the actor Martin Shaw:
Celebrity, the pursuit of the untalented by the mindless.
As a comedy, this book was good to read but it isn’t a book that I shall remember for ever. One of the things that surprised me was that the parts of the story that are text messages between the friends are not in text shorthand. Katy Birchall is very good at showing how teenage girls interact, with all their self obsession and self doubt and I am sure that her books will have a lot of followers.
• Buy this book at the Guardian Bookshop
