Airhead by Meg Cabot

One day, Em Watts is just Em Watts, a teenage tomboy with a love for video games and no love whatsoever for the Walking Dead, her name for the popular people at her school. The next day she is Nikki Howard, teenage supermodel. And there's nothing she can do about it.
Nope, there's no Freaky-Friday-esque spirit transfer. But seeing as Meg Cabot seems to want to keep most of the details under wraps, I won't give away the plot of Airhead any more than I already have. Let's just say that it's pretty darn cool. (Besides, if you really want to know, I'm sure you can find it online.)
Airhead is a thoroughly enjoyable book, not just because it's about a gamer geek trapped in the body of a supermodel, but because (despite what all the chick-lit-haters might say) Meg Cabot is quite a good writer. The heroine is likable, the supporting characters are amusing and believable, and the plot is clever and fun, though it occasionally dragged.
Airhead is the first in a trilogy, and it reads like it-- it seems more like the beginning of a story than a complete story in and of itself. This may bother some people, as it made the plot a bit slow at times. This format also means that readers (if they enjoyed the book) will be clamoring to read the second, because the end of Airhead seems more like (at risk of sounding clichéd) a beginning.
Airhead comes out on May 13.

All in all, I would say that Airhead makes a great light read. I give it four daggers out of five.



Glad that she is still residing in her own body, but also kind of wishing that she weren't because then she could have an adventure, and also writing very long sign-offs, and also, yours,

The Squad: Perfect Cover and The Squad: Killer Spirit by Jennifer Lynn Barnes

The Squad: Perfect Cover and The Squad: Killer Spirit by Jennifer Lynn Barnes are the first two books in a series.
Toby Klein was just your average high school hacker-loner-who-is-also-a-black-belt-in-karate, until she is recruited to join her school's varsity cheerleading squad-- something she would never do in a million years. Until she finds out that the squad is actually a cover for a team of highly trained government agents. Suddenly, Toby goes from being the aforementioned loner-hacker who occasionally beats up football players to being one of the most popular girls in school. She is quickly pulled into a web of intrigue, danger, and body glitter. Lots of body glitter.
Okay, so, yes, I do realize that this book is about cheerleader secret agents. But that fact notwithstanding, these are fun, enjoyable books. It helps that the main character is very anti-cheerleader, despite the fact that she is one. Also on the plus side, the main character is actually smart, something I would never have guessed by looking at the covers of the books. (I mean, cheerleader silouhettes? Really?) To be honest, I picked up the first one because I thought it would be amusing (unintentionally). I was suprised to find thatI actually enjoyed it (and then read the second one, of course). These are great light reads-- they're clever, there's action, and there's, um, pep rallies. Yeah. And best of all? They're actually written well. (And they're paperbacks, so they're cheap.) So if you've boon looking for something fun to read that you don't have to think about too hard, I've found it for you. You can thank me later.

I give these books 3.5 daggers each.

Cheerleading (or not), secret-agenting, and yours,

Bad Kitty by Michele Jaffe

Take one Meg Cabot Novel. Add mystery. Set in Las Vegas. Sprinkle with glitter. Voila! Bad Kitty by Michele Jaffe.
Jasmine is a girl with a talent for sleuthing. When she is dragged to Las Vegas for a family vacation, what can she do but encounter a mystery and try to solve it?
Usually when I read mystery novels I know exactly who did it and how chapters before the main character, and I just end up throwing the book across the room in frustration at the protagonist's stupidity. In Bad Kitty, I really didn't know the answer-- but I thought the protagonist was acting stupid anyway. Is it too much to ask for a main female character to be an intelligent person who doesn't jump to random, preposterous conclusions at the drop of a hat? The only time I've seen this done right was in Veronica Mars, where even if she was wrong, she was logical about it.
Aside from this, though, Bad Kitty is an entertaining, if not particularly deep, book. The main character is almost someone I might like, and the mystery is engaging and fun.

Bad Kitty is a good book to read if you want something light that doesn't require a huge amount of thought. The best thing about it is that, though it's a girly book (see sparkles on cover for proof), the characters aren't self-absorbed privileged, er, witches a la Gossip Girl. If you're a fan of Meg Cabot, you'll like this book. If you're not, you won't.

I give it 3 daggers.

Slightly angry, wishing that Veronica Mars hadn't been cancelled, and yours,

Poseur by Rachel Maude

Ah, Gossip Girl rip-offs. How I love them. And by love, I mean, of course, hate.
Take Gossip Girl. Subtract almost anything risque. Add fashion design. Relocate to LA. Voila! Poseur by Rachel Maude.
Poseur is the story of four very different girls, all of whom go to an exclusive LA high school. These girls (a ghetto-diva, a girly-girl, a punk, and a hippie) are foced to take a class together in which they must design their own fashion label. Hilarity attempts to ensue.
The book tried to be clever (and occasionally succeeded), but it was undermined by the fact that the author can't write well. At all.
The one good thing was the drawings that were scattered throughout the book (much as in Book of a Thousand Days by Shannon Hale). The author can't write, but she can definitely draw, and the characters looked exactly as I pictured them. It makes me think that Poseur would work much better as a slightly-vacuous-but-still-entertaining graphic novel.
I'd also like to take this opportunity to point out that the cover is horrendous. The designer obviously hasn't read the book (Though who can blame them?), and whoever dressed the models was obviously on crack. I mean, seriously.
Poseur is intended to be the first in a series.

I award Poseur a whopping... two daggers. One of them is only because of the drawings.

Horrified, critical, and yours,

Suitte Scarlett

Maureen Johnson, author of the recently-reviewed-by-us Girl At Sea, has another book that will, at some point in the future, come out. It's called Suitte Scarlett, and it's about a girl, and a hotel, and, um, some other stuff. And it's the first in a series!

But the most* exciting part is:

Holy thanksgiving turkey, batman! She's got eyes!

That's right, folks. The Curse of the Headless Torso has finally been broken.

* Besides, you know, the book's existence, and all.

Rejoicing, curse-foiling, and yours,

Girl at Sea

Girl at Sea by Maureen Johnson is about-- who would have guessed?-- a girl at sea.

Clio Ford is a 17-year-old girl with a most fabulous tattoo and, she thinks, a most fabulous summer plan. But then Things Go Terribly Wrong. Her mother, an artist (Clio is an artist as well) gets a fellowship for the summer that causes her to move to Kansas. Clio has to give up her summer job at the art store with the Cute Boy and spend the summer with her father on a yacht in Italy. Oh, the horror.

Yacht = good, right? Clio doesn't think so. Bad relationship with father + no Cute Boy + no art store = lots of teen angst. But it's all good fun. And anyway, there's another Cute Boy, and he's much more awesome.

Anyhow, there's an ancient archeological mystery, some jellyfish, and much snarkyness. Read it. Don't let the cover fool you-- it's good.*

Oh and Aiden (that's the Cute Boy-- the one on the boat, I mean, not the one from the art store) is most wonderful. And he has great hair.

I bestow upon this book 3.5 daggers, because it is enjoyable and very entertaining, not to mention well written... but it's fairly frivolous. I mean, it's not a great work of liturature, but who wants to read nothing but great works of literature?** But, I mean, it's good, but it's, er...

Okay. I'll say it.

It's a girly book.

You got a problem with that?

Laughing at headless girls, reading girly books, fearing jellyfish, and yours,

*For some reason, two other books by Maureen Johnson have covers with girls who only have half of a head. Disturbing.

** Okay, so quite a few people, but my point is NOT ME.