Rating: 3 stars
#CBR12 Bingo: Nostalgia (set in the 1990s, when I was a teenager)
Official book description:
Angus: My mixed-breed cat, half domestic tabby, half Scottish wildcat. The size of a small Labrador, only mad.
Thongs: Stupid underwear. What's the point of them, anyway? They just go up your bum, as far as I can tell.
Full-Frontal Snogging: Kissing with all the trimmings, lip to lip, open mouth, tongues ... everything.
Her dad's got the mentality of a Teletubby (only not so developed). Her cat, Angus, is trying to eat the poodle next door. And her best friend thinks she looks like an alien -- just because she accidentally shaved off her eyebrows. Ergghhhlack. Still, add a little boy-stalking, teacher-baiting, and full-frontal snogging with a Sex God, and Georgia's year just might turn out to be the most fabbitty fab fab ever!
If I read this book (the first in a long series about opinionated teenage girl Georgia Nicholson) at the right time, i.e. when I myself was a teenager, or near enough to it, I probably would have liked it a lot more. As a woman who recently turned 41, I'm very obviously not the target audience, I think this would probably be most suitable for the younger segment of the YA readers (I think older readers would want something a bit more sophisticated).
We follow Georgia Nicholson for a full year, through her diary entries. She complains a lot about her parents, especially her painfully exasperating dad, as well as her toddler sister, whom she clearly also loves a lot. Georgia is preoccupied with being popular, wearing make-up and getting the attention of boys. Since she goes to an all-girls school, with strict uniform requirements, being fashionable and cool, not to mention meeting boys regularly, is a bit of a challenge.
In many ways, Georgia and her friends, as described in this book, reminded me a lot of the girls we see in the delightful British sit com Derry Girls and meant, that while I didn't exactly relate a lot to her, neither did I find Georgia as exasperating as I suspect some adult readers might. She clearly has a lot of maturing to do, and could clearly be a slightly more understanding and patient daughter and certainly a more supportive friend. Alas, she is a teenage girl, one of the most self-absorbed and narcissistic creatures on the planet.
I got this book for free in an e-book offer several years ago. It was a fun enough read, but I doubt I'll be seeking out more books in the series. There are too many other books out there, aimed more at my demographic, that I could be reading instead.
Judging a book by its cover: The cat on this cover is nowhere near as big or mean-looking as the Angus of the book is described. Georgia claims he's the size of a small golden retriever. I imagined him a bit like Greebo from Pratchett's Discworld books, myself. They could really have done with making the cover a bit more exciting, actually.
Crossposted on Cannonball Read.
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