Peace, Love, and Baby Ducks by Lauren Myracle

This review is a little shorter than usual since my internet is being a demon and I need to finish this quickly.

[description from B&N]

Growing up in a world of wealth and pastel-tinted entitlement, fifteen-year-old Carly has always relied on the constancy—and authenticity—of her sister, Anna. But when fourteen-year-old Anna turns plastic-perfect-pretty over the course of a single summer, everything starts to change. And there are boys involved, complicating things as boys always do. With warmth, insight, and an unparalleled gift for finding humor even in stormy situations, beloved author Lauren Myracle dives into the tumultuous waters of sisterhood and shows that even very different sisters can learn to help each other stay afloat.

Review:

I've never read much Lauren Myracle stuff- I think only two books, and her parts in How to Be Bad and Let it Snow- but I've met her and read her blog, and she's awesome, so I picked this one up. I also have an older sister, so I figured I could relate to the sister things in this book. And I did.

Although I am definitely not the Anna and my sister is definitely not the Carly in our sisterhood, I still related to both of them. They act exactly like my sister and me; they laugh over the stupidity of things and make fun of their surroundings, and they fight most of the time. I could see parts of myself and my sister in both Carly and Anna, especially when they were arguing. My sister and I do that often.* But I do hope my sister and I aren't as unobvervant and stubborn and annoying as Carly could be. And I would hope my sister and I don't have any friends as stupid as some of Anna's. Because though the friends were realistic too, they were still annoying and little slow. Carly's friends were better, except for bad boy Cole.

Along with the realistic characters, the book is super funny. The funniness made the whole book better, since at times it is slow in parts. But when it did get a little slow, something ridiculous would happen, and I would giggle. The humor also provided some comic relief, as some more ~*serious*~ subjects are addressed in the book.

Main complaint: the ending is like a giant cheese fiesta. SO CHEESY. But cute.

Peace, Love, and Baby Ducks is a funny, unusually realistic tale of not only two sisters, but about finding yourself.

8/10

*Example of a typical conversation between The Sister and I (we share a room):

Me: I'm going to bed.
Sister: Lovely. *continues to type on computer*
Me: That means you should get out or stop typing and turn the light off.
Sister: No thanks. *types*
Me: GET OUT.
Sister: NO.
Me: Aoighewodsufiao. *makes lots of noise before getting in bed* *makes more noise with objects on dresser next to bed*
Sister: ARGH. *grabs computer and storms out of room*

Links: Lauren's site/blog/twitter/the Peace, Love, and Baby Ducks ning.

Dutton/Hardcover/$16.99/Amazon/Barnes and Noble/Borders/IndieBound