November 30, 2008

Review: I, Lorelei by Yeardley Smith



When eleven-year-old Lorelei Connelly's cat named Mud dies, she begins a diary to him. In it she chronicles her daily life with her family and her adventures in the sixth grade. She's also writing the diary to ensure that when she's a famous actress, chef and/or bestselling author her biographers can accurately report her life.

The diary begins with Lorelei trying out for the middle school Peter Pan production. Lorelei wants to try out for Tinkerbelle but her mom, who played Wendy in college, is dead set on her trying out for Wendy in this play. Lorelei wonders how to break the news to her mom when her mom goes so far as to dig out her old Wendy costume.

In the midst of Lorelei's normal tween drama which includes being replaced as Jenny's best friend by the much hated Veronica and being terrified by the school bully Matt Newsome, her parents' marriage begins to fall apart. We follow along in her journey as she shares it all with the much loved and missed Mud.

It's hard to believe that this is Smith's first book. The writing is excellent and she captured the eleven year old voice so perfectly that I truly felt that this book was written by a young girl. Lorelei's diary entries are funny and you can't help but root for her when things start to go wrong. I fell right into the story and the characters became loved. You know a book is great when you find yourself thinking about the characters long after you've finished reading.

This book is perfect reading for the tween crowd, ages 8-12 but I also recommend this book for any adult who loves reading young adult books also. I hope Smith continues writing books and that she ventures into adult books soon.

14 comments :

Wrighty said...

This is so cool! I have this book too but I haven't read it yet. Great job with the review! And you found a nice photo of the author. I wonder what they will chose for the cover. Now I'm even more anxious to read it!

Anonymous said...

This sounds like a wonderful book with the things that go on in school kids should be able to relate with this. Please give me a extra entry into Book of Nonsense.
I, Lorelei will be another book i add to my daughters reading list to get Thanks.
Lori Barnes
photoquest(at)bellsouth(dot)net

Anonymous said...

I thought this was a great book, too.

Kaye said...

This was a terrific book. The author did really capture the heart of an eleven year old. A very enjoyable story for anyone.

loves6cats said...

This sounds like an awesome read. I am not a young person nor do I have young children but do love reading books for the younger crowd now and then to take me back to when I was young. This will definitely be one that I pick up.

Lenore Appelhans said...

Ooh - can't wait to get started then...

/\Heather/\ said...

This sounds like a great book. To be perfectly honest, I think I like tween and teen books more than the adult books sometimes. Thanks for the review.

Ladytink_534 said...

It took me a second to realize why the author's name is familiar lol. She's Lisa Simpson's voice.

Anonymous said...

I loved your review on I, Loreli! I think that is a great book for young girls to read because it talks about many of the issues that they face such as friendship! great review!

Adele said...

great review.

Adele said...

great review.

Anonymous said...

I have this on my TBR ... I didn't know if would be good for my kids, but I'll offer it up to the 10- and 12- year olds this weekend.

thanks for the review!

loves6cats said...

Thanks for the book...I just received it today and started to read it as soon as I got it. She really is quite a good writer. I read over 50 pages within the first few minutes, didn't want to put it down. I can't wait to finish it. Thanks again!

Cheryl Vanatti said...

Just wanted to let you know that I linked to this post on The Wild Rumpus Starts
:-)