Revenge of the Girl with the Great Personality by Elizabeth Eulberg

Popularity proves double-edged Lexi has difficulty with both her longtime friends and her feelings for Taylor and Logan. Finally, her two best friends goad her into dolling up for school with the help of a pageant hairstylist and makeup artist, resulting in her immediate rise in popularity, and top dog Taylor, Logan’s best friend, asks her out on a date. She pays no attention to boys despite a secret crush on Logan, the boyfriend of a teen-pageant beauty. Lexi works and saves diligently to fund her dream of moving to New York. At 7, Mackenzie appears to love it, but Lexi suspects it’s her mom who’s addicted to the pageants, spending thousands every weekend despite the family’s near-poverty. Lexi finds herself trapped in a seriously dysfunctional family as her morbidly obese mother pushes her little sister into the child–beauty-pageant circuit.

Although this is a safe read for even young YA readers, the messages about beauty, family friendship should be discussed long after the book ends.Comedy yields to an affecting drama when a witty but plain girl decides to get glamorous, with unexpected results. Instead of enjoying her attentive new boyfriend ( FNL-named Taylor Riggins), Lexi continues to obsess over the unavailable Logan and second guess everyone's motives toward her. But once she's prettified, things take an angsty turn both between Lexi and her family and in terms of her own self-esteem. Lexi's life is fascinating - a supersized divorced mother whose only outlet is her 7-year-old daughter's pageants a baby sister who gets all the attention best friends who can't wait to escape to New York City with her and she's genuinely likable. But once she has her makeover and - voila! - becomes 'hot' in the eyes of her male classmates, all of a sudden Lexi feels better about herself, lands a gorgeous boyfriend, but is still unsure of whether she 'deserves' the attention, since it's based on her looks and not her personality. Lexi is sweet and smart, but because she doesn't attempt to wear makeup or curl her hair, she's largely unnoticed in the sea of Texas cheerleaders and pageant girls. Eulberg's novels, like Prom and Prejudice and The Lonely Hearts Club, tend to feature girls who are pretty clueless about guys in one way or another, and Revenge is more of the same.

Revenge of the Girl with the Great Personality by Elizabeth Eulberg