*** Warning: This review contains spoilers! ***
While all the books of this series have involved boys to some extent, this book seemed to veer away from the "coming of age" gestalt that characterized earlier books and more towards "chick lit". There was just an awful lot about boys in this book, what with Jess and Emma having boyfriends, Cassidy finally being interested in boys, and Becca and Megan fighting over a boy.
Of course, this being the fifth book in the series, I'm already invested in the characters, so it wasn't hard to keep reading, even when I felt disappointed. I really liked that Becca finally got her own chapters in this book. She's a complex character, and I surprise myself when I say that she's probably my second-favorite character after Cassidy, who matured a lot in this book.
Mrs. Chadwick continued to float around the edge of the friendship circle. I really disliked that she was still being portrayed as being petty and jealous. Frankly, in my opinion, she was the only one keeping it real! If all my friends were constantly gushing over another friend who was just the perfect cross between Heidi Klum and Martha Stewart, I'd probably spend a lot of my time rolling my eyes, too! And, in a group of well-educated middle-to-upper-class suburbanites, Mrs. Chadwick was the only person to question the prudence of a college sophomore getting engaged!?
In all the books so far, the girls' crushes didn't always work out, but any romance angles had happily ever after endings. In this installment, I liked that one of the girls was finally unlucky in love. Yes, it was a shame, but it was also a more realistic portrayal of teenage romance, and anyway, I didn't think she deserved him anyway! Unfortunately, the true-to-life pull-yourself-together-after-a-break-up lesson didn't really fly because apparently, the whole time, she was just waiting by the phone to be at the beck and call of the boy, in case he changed his mind! The book had a chance to show young female readers how one could handle a break-up in a healthy, self-respecting, and empowered way - but then it blew it. Though Becca didn't go through an actual break-up, her pragmatic move-on attitude was much more admirable.
This book definitely had more conflicts than previous books in the series, and I liked that even though everyone traveled over the holidays, no one had the kind of amazing, over-the-top, perfect-in-every-way experience that was so common in earlier books. This time around, the girls really fought, and we finally saw the rocky side of friendships. As I said before, I think Cassidy is now my favorite character (initially I preferred Emma), and I liked how in this book, she kind of stayed above the fray of the fighting. I liked, too, that Cassidy was fully aware that she didn't have a BFF the way Jess and Emma were best friends, or Megan and Becca, but she was okay with that. I'm sure there are plenty of young readers who would identify with that part of Cassidy.
So, overall, while I liked the character development of Becca and Cassidy, I wasn't too fond of Megan's character, and all the conflicts were just too boy-centered for my tastes. Admittedly, though, I'm sure most 15-year-old girls do spend most of their time obsessing over boys, and I'm glad that this book did drive home the "best friends before boyfriends" message.
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