I love this book. I read it when I was in the fifth grade and when I reread it now it brings back so many old memories, good and bad.

I remember back in fifth grade I had like the biggest crush on these 2 guys who shall remain nameless and I just wouldn't shut up about it. Honestly I'm a bit shocked I got through the fifth grade without getting strangled by my friends at least once. I talked about these 2 guys so much that I started code naming them Jack and David from the character in All-American Girl. I mean, it was crazy because I'd be like "Did you know that Jack looked back at me on math???" and my friend would be like "OK. which one is jack again?" Thinking back about it, I just want to scream. I led such an embarrassing life when I was little. But it wasn't all crazy and horrible, this book actually made me a whole lot braver. I actually got the guts to give one of my crush chocolate on valentines day (so I kinda gave everyone chocolates to cover my tracks but his was the biggest. I tried my best to be subtle about it, okay. I really did. Don't laugh at me) because I was like "OK if Sam can finally be brave enough to face David at the art class and she ended up with him then so can i" so I literally threw a huge pack of Toblerone at 'Jack' and I was like 'Here' and he looked positively scared because we've never even talked before and 'Jack' was like 'Whoa. This is for me?' and I said 'Yeah' then he said 'Thanks!' and at the end of the day I heard he started dating a senior and I cried then I swore off boys forever. The end.

I could relate to Sam because she is a middle child and so am i. Her sister is super popular and so was my sister! We're both treated like we're invisible and there's nothing special about us except the fact that we both just really really love art. I literally acted like Sam (the weird artistic girl who cares about stuff no one bothered to care about) and I even started comparing everyone I knew in real life to the characters from this book. That's how much I loved it. I even quoted words from it and spoke like the way the characters in this book did. I read this book at least twice every month and everytime my Mom caught me reading it she would roll her eyes and made a rude comment about me not having a life. Everytime we travelled I'd bring this book, Confession of a Teenage Drama Queen and Philip Pullman's The Golden Compass with me. Trust me, those 3 books are the most battered looking book I own and I'm not the kind of person who would treat my books with disrespect. I just loved those 3 books so much that they're almost always with me like a rag doll or something, I even dared to write my name at the first page of those books with glittered pen, curlicues and all.

Now I can't say that this book is the best book I've ever read or to say that this book is even better than so and so but it has sentimental value and it was one of the very first books I've read so it left such a great impression on me and that matters to me so 5/5 through and through, forever and always for this one no matter how much embarrassing shit it has put me through.