JESSICA DARLING’S IT LIST #1 by Megan McCafferty Book Review
Series: Jessica Darling’s It List, #1
Publication Date: September 3rd 2013 by Poppy
Rating: 
– Poor | 
Book Summary: Move over, Dork Diaries! Jessica Darling, star of Megan McCafferty’s bestselling Jessica Darling series for adults, is back in a hilarious new series perfect for tween (10 to 14) girls.
I hadn’t even gotten to homeroom yet and I’d already discovered five hard truths about junior high:
1. My best friend had turned pretty.
2. She didn’t know it yet.
3. It wouldn’t be long before she did.
4. That knowledge would change everything between us.
5. And there wasn’t a thing I could do about it.It’s the first day of seventh grade. Is Jessica Darling doomed for dorkdom?
New York Times bestselling author Megan McCafferty’s hilarious series opener will have you laughing, cringing, and cheering for Jessica Darling as she learns that being herself beats being popular, pretty & perfect any day
Jessica Darling’s It List #1 by Megan McCafferty Book Review Overview:
- Jessica Darling’s It List #1 was just a big disappointment
- I never actually laughed out loud while reading, unfunny
- The book is a bummer but it made me want to reread Jessica Darling all over again
It really just pains me to say this, but Jessica Darling’s It List #1 was just a big disappointment.
You know, maybe if I hadn’t read the Jessica Darling series all those years ago, I probably would have liked this book. Jessica’s funny, I guess. I can see the similarities in her younger self in her older self – which is pretty important. But I never actually laughed out loud when it came to reading. Which is a total bummer because Megan McCafferty can totally make me laugh in her other books. I’m also not attributing this to “middle grade humor” because I’ve read other middle grade books that managed to make me laugh out loud (example: Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson series). The fact that Jessica Darling’s It List was unfunny was extremely disappointing.
I guess it’s nice to see how the characters developed from their middle school days to their high school days… but was I the least bit curious about it before I read Jessica Darling’s It List? No, not at all. In fact, when I first found out about the series I just wanted to cringe. I’ve enjoyed Megan McCafferty’s other series (Bumped) so it felt a bit like a sell-out to me when I found out that she was doing a spin-off of Jessica Darling.
On the upside, the only two characters that I really enjoyed reading about were Hope and Marcus Flutie – yup, the Marcus Flutie. I guess they were the only normal characters that never talked in CONSTANT CAPITALS AND EXCLAMATIONS!!! — which could get pretty tiring.
The only good thing that came out of reading Jessica Darling’s It List is that it made me want to reread the whole Jessica Darling series all over again. I did not get the warm fuzzies with this book that I got when reading the Jessica Darling series. I wish that Jessica Darling’s It List was able to prove me wrong, but this is just another spin-off series that should not have happened.
About the Author
Megan edited a short story anthology called SIXTEEN: Stories About That Sweet and Bitter Birthday. She has contributed to several fiction and nonfiction anthologies including DEAR BULLY, MY LITTLE RED BOOK, DOES THIS BOOK MAKE ME LOOK FAT? and EVERYTHING I NEED TO KNOW ABOUT BEING A GIRL I LEARNED FROM JUDY BLUME. Her work has been translated into eleven languages, including German, Chinese and Hungarian. |
Find the Author
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Megan McCafferty is the author of BUMPED, a satirical dystopian YA novel published by the Balzer + Bray imprint of HarperCollins. She also wrote the bestselling Jessica Darling series: SLOPPY FIRSTS, SECOND HELPINGS, CHARMED THIRDS, FOURTH COMINGS and PERFECT FIFTHS.