Just Peachy

Peaches McBride is an ordinary girl, but unfortunately she is the middle one in  family of five and all the others seem to be very talented.  Add to this the fact that her dad is a radio presenter and her mother is always running after the others and you can see that life is often difficult.  In order to have some independence, Peaches asks to go to a different school from her older siblings when she reaches year 7.  This enables her to make friends who are not trying to get to her family and especially Millie, who is straightforward, friendly and very normal.

This book is very much in the mode of Jacqueline Wilson and Cathy Cassidy.  It is about friendship, knowing who you are and not being cowed by people whose talents might be more obvious, but who actually are never as perfect as you think they are.  Young pre-teens are faced with so many role models and targets about what they should be achieving, to the extent that they become worried if they are not keeping up with everyone else.  This book joins those which say it is ok to be ordinary, to be fairly good at things but not fantastic at any of them.  A good read  well pitched toward the intended audience.