Customer Reviews

A Secret Friend

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I really didn't like this book. I didn't like most of the characters, either.

The protagonist is a foolish girl named Jessica. She is in the 4th grade, has an older sister in college and another sister in middle school. Helen, the middle girl was the only one I liked in this Saga of Sillyness. Bright and independent, Helen is the only realist in that household. The girls' dad was a shadow figure.

I could not stand the girls' mother. She was clingy and needy and singularly intrusive. I didn't like the way she thought she could patch up Jessica's rift with another girl and literally buy her child friends. I also didn't like the way she pretended to like Jessica's suggestion to do her room in a patriotic theme while subtly steering her away to what she, the mother wanted the room to look like. Forcing that flokati rug on Jessica while pretending to let her make decisions really tore it for me.

I also didn't like the way she would call Jessica for a hugfest while the child was getting ready for school. It seemed to me that she could have at least waited until Jessica came home, rather than calling her over just as she was about to leave for school.

Jessica does a lot of stupid and inane things. She writes herself notes signed from "a friend" with the idea of luring other kids to like her. Jessica was infantile and foolish and impossible to like. A pie in the face for Jessica!