Book Review: "Confessions of a Teen Nanny"

With a title such as this one, one might assume that Confessions of a Teen Nanny would be a book akin to perhaps a slightly older Babysitter's Club type of story. Spoiler alert: this is nothing like that whatsoever. Imagine, if you will, being a teenager who by some act of fate manages to land just about THE sweetest babysitting job ever: nannying for one of the richest families in the entirety of New York City. The catch: the teen daughter is going to make your life an absolute living hell.

Without giving too much away, I just want to say that this story was actually pretty engaging, and it delights me to learn that this is part of a series, so there's much more to this story than just what lies between these covers. I can't wait to see where else it goes! Rating this one a 4 star rating.

Book Review: "Star Power (Talent #3)"

In this final installment of Zoey Dean's Talent series, the girls are truly finding themselves on the up and up. Mac has taken it upon herself to become everybody's agent. (It used to just be Emily's.) She starts out meaning well, but soon becomes heady with power and starts letting it get to her. Emily is still in full swing of her Davey Woodward crush, and it's only coming out more and more in spades since working with him on set in a romantic role. Becks has been signed on as the fourth Dixie Girl, which are a world-renowned surf team. And Coco is trying to make a name for herself as a singer, and not as just Cardammon's daughter. But since Mac keeps putting her managerial duties first and friendship second, and as is to be expected, ends up making a huge mess out of things. As with most things, things find a way of working out in the end, and ends up on a cute note.

I'll be sad to see the girls go, but at the same time, one can really only put up with so much middle school drama. After all, isn't living it firsthand once enough? But I did enjoy the story, and I'm rating this one a 4 1/2 out of 5 stars.

Book Review: "Almost Famous (Talent #2)"

This second installment of Zoey Dean's Talent series is thankfully a huge step up from its predecessor. Whereas the first book in the series was bland and boring, this one is filled with juicy drama all the way through, and really fleshes out what each character is all about. It's all in the tone of middle school drama gone VERY awry, and eventual revenge. However, morality is to be upheld, and the underlying message is that revenge doesn't pay, no matter how badly you've been burned. (It would've been too predictable if everything had ended up working out according to plan with the revenge plots.) I think there's a lot of themes throughout this book though that most people can relate to on some level, as most people have been harassed in school at some point in their lives; maybe not to the degree these girls are, but it still gets its point across. Regardless, I'm voting this one a big 5 stars :)

Book Review: "Talent"

Outside of her The A-List series, Zoey Dean has another offering for us with a miniseries meant for a slightly younger demographic, starting with this book, Talent.

The premise is basically this: Emily, a typical all-American girl from Iowa, comes to LA to visit the city with her mother and her best friend for a week. Just as Hollywood-obsessed as most girls their age, they soak up every little detail about the business that they can... but especially when it comes to their movie star obsession, Davey Woodward. There's the typical levels of teenage star obsession...and then there's these girls. Who, after hearing that Davey has a movie premiere party just 10 blocks away from where their hotel is they're staying at, sneak out after Emily's mom falls asleep that night. Paige gets turned away from the door immediately, whereas Emily succeeds in lying her way into the party. She's quickly discovered by the one girl who caught her little 'performance', whose mother just happens to represent Davey - along with 90% of the rest of young Hollywood. Feeling that she's stumbled upon something special here, she decides to try and make Emily a star. However, as her mother's not willing to even hear her out for her efforts, she's left to do this almost entirely on her own...and it inevitably proves to be much harder than she ever could have anticipated.

I get the feeling that this book was aimed for a middle school demographic, and is written as such. It's not bad - it's actually a very cute read, not to mention a quick one at that (despite being almost 300 pages). It's just interesting enough to have picqued my interest into wanting to check out the next book in the series. :) Rating this one 4 out of 5 stars.

Book Review: "Emily The Strange: Dark Times"

Emily The Strange: Dark Times is another novel in the Emily The Strange series; the newest one to date that's been released, I believe. This time, Emily has moved to another new town (as usual) and soon builds a time machine, with intentions of learning about the past through firsthand experience. Emily also enrolls in homeschooling this time around, which quickly leads to her mother teaching her a course about the family history - especially the Dark Aunts. There happens to be quite a mystery about her aunt Lily's premature demise that just doesn't add up, so she decides to go back in time to find out what really happened - and to try and save her life, if she can. However, she runs out of liquid black rock (the magical substance she runs the machine with) and gets stuck in the 1700's - how will she get home? You'll have to read it to find out.

I liked this book because it had a much more in depth plot to it than the last Emily the Strange book I read. It was totally gripping, and I found mysef having read the entire thing in 2 or 3 days because I just couldn't put it down! Very, very good. 5 stars!

Book Review: "Emily The Strange: Stranger and Stranger"

I must confess; when I saw a couple of Emily The Strange books on the shelf at my local library recently, I inwardly squealed with glee. I didn't know there were any books about this girl; I thought she was just a fashion logo. I'd been very intrigued by her when I was about 14 because I felt she looked like a cartoon version of myself. Anyway. Needless to say, I grabbed the books. They're not the first in the series, so I'm sure there's some backhistory I missed out on, but that's okay. It's still pretty straightforward.

The first of the books I read was Emily The Strange: Stranger and Stranger written by Jessica Gruner, Rob Reger, and Buzz Parker. The book is written in the style of a tween journal. A dark, semi-gothic and almost sociopathic journal, but a journal nonetheless, complete with drawings all over the margins. The story basically goes on to tell how Emily has moved to another new town, and in getting settled, invented a duplication device. Her initial ideas for purpose was to clone everyone in town and sit back to watch the pranking begin. However, she accidentally clones herself, and chaos ensues. She quickly comes to learn that this is not a perfect clone of herself; oh no. By outward appearances, yes. However, as a person... the device split her good and bad sides into two different people. So she herself has stayed good, and then there's basically an evil twin of herself running around rampant. How will she manage to remedy this? You'll have to read on to find out.

As far as quality goes, this is an incredibly easy read since it was intended for a tween audience. Had I have had the time to do so, I could have read this in a single sitting. So, if you're looking for a 'silent reading' book for school, this probably isn't the best pick, but if it's just for fun, I'd recommend it. Anyway, I'd rate it maybe a 3 and a half out of 5 stars. It's not bad, but it's not some fantastic amazing piece of literature. That said, it IS a fun read!