Book Review: Girl 15 Flirting For England by Sue Limb

Goodreads description

A hilarious prequel rounds out our funny chick lit series.

Jess Jordan is barely 15. Fred is her often-aggravating best guy friend; her father is a lonely bachelor; Flora is her gorgeous best friend, a constant liability; and Ben Jones is barely a twinkle in her eye. Into this innocent scene are dropped 30 or so helpless French exchange students. Jess and her mother are assigned to house Eduoard, a shy, awkward, and painfully English-deprived boy Jess’s age. To counter what Jess fears is Eduoard’s growing crush on her, Jess convinces her friend Fred to pose as her boyfriend, but he refuses to take their fake relationship seriously. Add a gorgeous, womanizing French student, an ill-fated camping trip in a student’s backyard, and Flora just being, well, Flora, and you have all the makings of an international incident. Will Jess be able to keep the peace, or even translate the whole debacle to the confused French students? The future of England is on the line. . . .

My Review

This book turned out exactly what I expected it to be: a humorous story about the many problems and boyfriend blues of a teenage girl. It is not the usual type of book that I would pick up but I found it a refreshing and welcome break. In the first chapter we meet Jess Jordan trying in vain to write the perfect introductory letter to her French exchange partner Eduoard who she is convinced he is going to be the hottest boy she has ever met. Suddenly she wishes she had paid attention in her French classes instead of messing around with her best friend Flora. When Eduoard finally arrives a few weeks later he is a far cry from what Jess imagined and her dream of a handsome French boyfriend is crushed......

Jess, the main character is one that I could relate to being around her age and the story revolves around her finding her place among her friends, experiencing her first boyfriend blues and coping with crushes as well as life's disasters and disappointments. Her parents are divorced and she lives with her mum who works as a librarian (yay) and just like many teenage girls she is often embarrassed by them. They might not always be the best parents in the world and despite living apart it is obvious that they really care about Jess and want the best for her. One thing that stood out to me was that her mum was at home a lot of the time in the house scenes of the book for example chatting over breakfast with Jess and it was nice to see their relationship together. Jess also had to persuade her parents to let her do things and go out  and all this was a pleasant because in a lot of YA books the 'disappearing and non existent parents' theme is common.

I liked how I was left to imagine what Jess looked like for myself because she was never properly described in the book and I thought of her as not the most beautiful, smartest or most popular girl in the school but pretty and a good friend. Despite her many flaws, I thought she coped well in the situations she found herself and remained loyal to herself and her

friends.

The plot was lively and fast paced but preditable whilst the characters were sometimes a bit flat. For example the stock beauitfully gorgeous blonde haired best friend and the crazy and joke cracking guy best friend. However, Sue Limb's witty dialogue and banter made up for this. It had me in fits of giggles! There are some times when I'm just looking just for an escape or a laugh and not an amazing plot and exceptionally rounded characters. Girl 15' fitted this category very well and kept me wanting more.

Verdict:


‘Looking for a book that will give you a good giggle? The hilariously insane trials of Jess Jordan certainly did the trick for me and every teenage girl will relate to them. Read it if you're looking for a laugh.’

Rating: 3 stars