Reviews

My Perfect Life by Dyan Sheldon

shirleymak's review against another edition

3.0

i may or may not have read this already.

dervladaly_'s review against another edition

lighthearted relaxing fast-paced

• Plot- or character-driven? Character
• Strong character development? Yes
• Loveable characters? N/A
• Diverse cast of characters? No
• Flaws of characters a main focus? No

1.75

ellemaddy's review

4.0

My Perfect Life is a sequel to Confession of a Teenage Drama Queen by Dyan Sheldon. When I was in junior high school Coatdq was my fave. I mean, I literally re-read it for about a gajillion time, even my Mom knows that it's one of my fave books and my mom doesn't give a heck about shit like this. It's like everytime we go somewhere I always bring coatdq and my perfect life with me, sometimes the golden compass, all-american girl or any books written by meg cabot really and other books I currently read at that time. I don't know why I love these two books so much. Maybe because there's no stupid romance in this book and the characters are so unique and Lola is super dramatic and artsy which inspired me to no end when I was a teenager. I love the friendship of Lola and Ella and how forgiving Ella is. Anyway, in this book we get to know more about Ella and her so called 'perfect life' which turned out to be not so perfect. Her Mom is an alcoholic (which explained why she was so good at dealing with drunk Stu Wolff!) and her parents aren't exactly the happy couple everyone thought they were. There's also more competition with Carla Santini here and there's one part where Lola and Ella wore costume and Ella pretended to be her Mom to cater at Carla's campaign party because her Mom passed out drunk. It was so much fun to read. This book has all the kind of things I appreciate in my teenage years, the teenage struggles, the problems, teenage me LOVED it because she could relate to it and even until now when I'm not even a teenager anymore, reading this book still brings me the good and the bad memories from my teenage years and it makes me nostalgic as hell.

meganlouise815's review

1.0

This book was honestly so dull. Going into it, I didn't expect much at all because I have read a book by Dyan Sheldon before: My Worst Best Friend and although at the time, I enjoyed it, I was only about 13 so that's expected. I think the main problem was how bloody irrelevant it was. There wasn't really a message, there was the clear mean girl and her minions, the quiet and reserved MC and then her crazy friend who was way too big for her boots. It was just so clichéd. The MC and the 'mean' girl - ex best friends - were battling it out to see how could be the President of their school.

I enjoyed the fact that there wasn't any romance in it - it's a rarity to find a book with zero romance and I enjoyed it. I also enjoyed the family dynamic that Ella's family had... well, lack of family, really. Her parents - masked by perfection and cleanliness - were having problems and Ella's mother was an alcoholic. And I liked that about this story because it seemed like a realistic thing. The only problem was the lack of spotlight put on it.

Ella did change slightly throughout the novel, but none of the other characters did. I absolutely detested Lola, Ella's new friend, because she was just so... arrogant. And Carla - eww. There was zero background on the supporting characters. And I have a great question: Why in hell did Ella's mother want to help Carla with her campaign? Her daughter was against her and she chose to help? That's just.... wrong. And why did Ella not say anything?

Urgh, it was just an infuriating book with infuriating characters.