Booktalk: Reality Check by Jen Calonita [Teen Chick Lit; 3]

You know how you act differently if you think a lot of people are watching you, and scrutinizing your actions? Try having the whole country watching you. That’s the case with Charlie. When we first meet her, she’s the ringleader of a group of very tight high school girls. They live in a small town and do small-town stuff. Charlie, for example, works at a coffeehouse called Milk and Sugar. Pretty normal. But there’s a woman who keeps coming in to Milk and Sugar every day, from out of town, asking Charlie a lot of questions, admiring her spirit and personality, and supposedly catching up on some reading. She even wants to meet Charlie’s friends and learn as much as she can about them. There’s Brooke, with red hair and a very direct manner; Hallie, with long curly brown hair, the daughter of local restaurant owners; and Keiran, Charlie’s oldest friend, who is blonde and super pretty and spends a lot of her free time babysitting her younger siblings. The girls are a team, and a very attractive one. The woman, as it turns out, is from the Fire and Ice Network, sort of like MTV, which produces teen reality shows. She offers the girl a contract, with mega-bucks and glamorous parties attached. The show is going to be called “The Cliffs,” after Cliffside, the name of their small beach community town. But there’s a real danger to exposing your private life and your friendships and your feelings to the whole world. Can these close friends stay true to each other and expose themselves to the whole country? Reality Check by Jen Calonita.

Reality Check by Jen Calonita. 277 p. Poppy/Little, Brown: 2010. Booktalk to high school, possibly adults who like chick lit.

Booktalk: Vintage Veronica by Erica S. Perl [Teen Chick Lit; 2]

If you saw 15-year-old Veronica walking down the street, you’d notice her clothes first. She might have on a bright pink poufy skirt from the 1950s, men’s bowling shoes, cat-eye glasses, and a vintage guayabera shirt. You’d also notice that, besides being pretty, she’s on the heavy side. At school, Veronica has been both picked on and ignored due to her weight. Let’s just say she has trust issues with other teens. But Veronica is talented, and she’s got a really cool job at this vintage clothing store called The Consignment Corner, secluded away from the public in her little corner two flights up, deciding on which clothes get sold to the public and which ones get trashed. It’s actually a really important job there. The owners noticed that she has a real eye for clothing: she knows her styles, cut, materials, and details. She’s an expert on vintage clothes, unlike the other employees. Speaking of the other employees, they’re starting to notice Veronica. The two alpha girls who work retail, Zoe and Ginger, will now actually talk to Veronica and seek her out, even though she’s a little afraid of them both. They’re charismatic, self-confident, and mean. And then there’s this boy called the Nail (real name: Lenny) . He’s a stockboy whom Zoe and Ginger make fun of. But Veronica starts to think he’s kind of cute, and he’s actually really nice to her: that’s a first, with Veronica and guys. But Zoe and Ginger hate Lenny, and he doesn’t exactly like them, either. Remember that Veronica is vulnerable – she’s got practically no dating history, and she’s hungry both for female friends and a little male attention. Whom will she chose? Or will Veronica screw it up and lose them all? Vintage Veronica by Erica S. Perl.

Vintage Veronica by Erica S. Perl. Knopf, 2010. 279 p. Booktalk to high school, adult.

Booktalk: Jane by April Lindner [Teen Chick Lit; 1]

If you've read Jane Eyre by Charlotte Bronte, you'll remember that Jane Eyre is a young 19th-century English woman who has had a tough childhood and is an orphan. As a young woman, she goes to work as a nanny for Mr. Rochester, a brooding, handsome, temperamental, and wealthy man who seems to be single but has a mysterious past. It's part ghost story and part romance: Jane and Mr. Rochester are both intriguing, strong-willed characters. This novel, Jane by April Lindner, locates the story in modern America: the original Jane Eyre inspires the story but doesn't dictate it. Jane Moore is 19 and has dropped out of Sarah Lawrence College. Both of her parents died recently in a car crash, and she doesn't have the money to stay in college. She applies to a nanny agency, and due to complete lack of knowledge in rock music [plus her total disinterest in rock stars], she gets an interesting nanny assignment. She's to be the nanny to the daughter of the country's most famous and most influential rock star, Nico Rathburn. Nico has a past of wild living, drugs, and failed marriage. He lives on a huge, somewhat isolated estate, Thornfield Park. Jane is a good nanny to his daughter, but she's confused when she starts having feelings for Nico, and especially confused when he show genuine interest and affection for her. What would a glamorous, rich rock star see in a plain Jane like herself? And more perplexingly, who has he stashed away on the forbidden third floor of his mansion, with a ghostly, female-sounding laugh?

Jane by April Lindner. Poppy/Little, Brown: 2010. 373 p. Booktalk to older teens [be aware of adult content issues] and to adults.