Dedication - Nicola Kraus & Emma McLaughlin

Summary: 6th grade girl meets well-off boy with issues who repeatedly treats her like crap. Girl is incapable of learning from experience. After experience. After experience. Boy becomes a famous singer on the back of his friends' (uncredited) work and songs about the girl and her family. At 30, will girl finally get that boy is an ass, or will true love out?

In an effort to be more like Lynn, who doesn't waffle on about the plot like I do, I thought I'd try a one sentence summary and take it from there. Sigh - even my summaries waffle.
Dedication switches between 30 year-old Kate (presents-to-the-UN successful not-for-profit environmentalist heading home at Christmas time to confront the guy who repeatedly let her down, stood her up for prom, cheated their friends out of royalties, achieved world stardom, still writes songs about her, and broke her heart) and flashbacks to Katie the child and her relatonship with Jake Sharpe (from 6th grade, when she and her parents first move to Vermont, she randomly picks Jake as the guy she likes when the popular girls force her to pick someone, to college).
I found this book profoundly irritating - Kat(i)e fails to learn from experience even when hit over the head with a giant sign saying "Jake will let you down if you give him the slenderest of openings! No! Noooo!" I get that I don't get the whole prom thing (Australia's version, the high school social, is clearly no equivalent), but even the rest of it's pretty dire - school-related or social, if Kat(i)e relies on him Jake bails. But that doesn't diminish her love (or devotion).
I haven't read the authors' other work, including the very successful The Nanny Diaries, and I am sincerely greatful. I'm also thrilled beyond words that I decided not to buy this when I saw it on a Borders 3-for-2 table and instead borrowed it from the library. money I'd never have got back. - Alex