Crazy in Love / Dandi Davey Mackall

Summary - Mary Jane Ettermeyer hears voices in her head, but they're all hers-and she's going to need every single one of them to get through life, now that she's fallen hard for the amazing Jackson House. No matter how desperately she fights it, Mary Jane is crazy in love, even though: a) Jackson House can't possibly think she's cute enough to be his date, so it must be some cosmic joke; b) MJ has vowed to keep her vows made with best friends, who formed Abstinence in Action (in spite of the vow involving no action); and c) she shouldn't even be flirting with Jackson because he already has a girlfriend...who happens to be MJ's friend.

Review - This book is all about the two voices you have in your head; the conservative one and the party girl. I felt like this book had a bit of a split personality as well. It could have been good if it had disregarded the stupid premise and stuck to the story. The protagonist has conversations with her good and bad side continuously and I found myself immediately skipping over them right from the beginning.

This is a girl who has a mad crush on one her friend, Star's boyfriend and upon picking up pop from a store with him, get labelled with the tart tag. Although it was innocent, there were four minutes unaccounted for and as such Star starts an all out anti-MJ campaign. She uses the bullying as a way to justify the progression of her realtionship with Jackson. I admit to being pretty black and white (and maybe a tad judgemental) but this didn't sit well with me. Especially when MJ is painted as a victim of the gossip swirling around the school (she is one, but she put herself in that position).

There are many narrative points that I am going to skim over because I felt they were all rather cliche. There's the cute-as-pie sister with a disability, the abstinence pledge, a character that foretells what MJ's future could be if she betrays her pledge and a really mean girl. The fact that the mean, ex-friend is called Star just irked me from the beginning. Character development was minimal, clunked into scenes like I should be impressed. MJ makes some dubious choices and the fact that she is so loving and supportive of her sister seems to be put forward as a redeeming quality. At times, I felt like I was sitting in a (contradictory) morals class that I never signed up for.

In all honesty, the book didn't sit right with me but I can see some people liking it. To me, it appeared that Mackall had written it without passion, which sounds harsh but this discombobulated mess just annoyed me to no end.

Published: 2007
Format: Paperback, 192 pages
Publishers: Dutton
Origin: USA
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