Invisible by Marni Bates

*** 1/2

From KTeen:

It's not easy being best friends with a celebrity...

I'm invisible at my high school and I'm fine with it.  It's kind of inevitable with a name like Jane Smith.  But when the school newspaper staff insisted that I write a cover story, I decided to find out just how much scandal one geeky girl could uncover.

Except I never expected to find myself starting a fistfight, auditioning for the school's Romeo and Juliet musical, running away with a Romeo of my own, befriending the most popular girl in school, or trying to avoid one very cute photographer, who makes it impossible to be invisible...

I admit, Decked With Holly remains my favorite in this series, but Invisible was a cute, fun read that had me laughing out loud.  Jane is a very typical teen in her reactions to the troubles with her friends.  And while the situations in the books exaggerated and unbelievable, the reactions and characters stay true to themselves.  

I will admit that I was puzzled by Jane's attraction to Scott, who spends most of the book acting like a complete jerk and is openly hostile.  The only thing that makes him remotely redeemable (aside from being cute), is that he challenges Jane where everyone else coddles her.  Still, this wasn't enough for me to actually like or root for him.

If you haven't started this series yet, definitely pick it up for your fun, light reading requirements.  The next in the series, Notable adds a little mystery to the mix and I cannot wait to see how the Queen of the Notables handles life in Cambodia.  Notable is available October 29, 2013.

~Shel

Decked With Holly by Marni Bates

***1/2

From Kensington Teen:

Holly Dayton is about to go way out of her comfort zone…

Spending Christmas vacation on a cruise with her two cousins from hell isn’t Holly’s idea of a good time. And when in a moment of seasick-fueled desperation she lurches into an open suite—she’s greeted with an eyeful of pepper spray. The culprit? A gorgeous guy calling himself Nick. But when Holly goes to make her exit, she gets the shock of her life: a corridor crammed with screaming teenage fans. Because Nick just happens to be Dominic Wyatt, drummer for ReadySet—one of the hottest bands in America.

Suddenly rumors are swirling, and Holly’s face is captured on countless phones and plastered all over the Internet. But the band can’t risk a scandal destroying their family-friendly image, so Dominic convinces Holly to be his fake girlfriend—just for two weeks. How bad could it be to be fauxmantically involved with one of the cutest rockstars on the planet? Holly’s about to find out…

 

Decked With Holly is a very Cinderella story, complete with a wicked step-mother, horrible step-sisters and loveable orphan Holly.  In our story, Holly lost her parents as a baby and was raised by her aging, but loving grandfather.  Holly’s wicked step-mother is actually her Aunt and her female cousins play the role of the step-sisters.  And they are completely horrible people lacking any redeeming qualities.   And while Grandpa is old, there’s no excuse for him not telling his daughter and granddaughters to shut the hell up.  And the other men/guys in the book all sit silently by while the Aunt and cousins put the meanest of “mean girls” to shame.  Our rock star Nick isn’t exactly charming, but he is a modern day prince as the drummer in an uber-popular boy band.    

Decked With Holly is hilarious, which I wan't expecting.  I haven’t giggled that much during a book since Plum Spooky by Janet Evanovich.  While the supporting characters are exaggerated, Holly and Dominic feel surprisingly honest in their one-on-one interactions.  I enjoyed Decked With Holly and think it should be on everyone’s holiday reading list this year.  I haven’t read Bates’ debut Awkward, but I am definitely going to pick it up. 

~Shel