Review: The Carrie Diaries by Candace Bushnell

Title: The Carrie Diaries

Author: Candace Bushnell

Published: HarperCollins (April 29th 2010)

No. of Pages: 389

Grade Rating: A-

Before Carrie Bradshaw hit the big time in the City, she was a regular girl growing up in the suburbs of Connecticut. How did she turn into one of the most-read social observers of our generation?

The Carrie Diaries opens up in Carrie's senior year of high school. She and her best friends -- Walt, Lali, Maggie, and the Mouse -- are inseparable, amid the sea of Jens, Jocks and Jets. And then Sebastian Kydd comes into the picture. Sebastian is a bad boy-older, intriguing, and unpredictable. Carrie falls into the relationship that she was always supposed to have in high school-until a friend's betrayal makes her question everything. With her high school days coming to a close, Carrie will realize it's finally time to go after everything she ever wanted.

The Carrie Diaries is a superb young adult novel with the true voice of one of the most loved female protagonists of our time. Mixing love, heartbreak and some serious fashion, this will be a must-read for teenage girls who want a great girly escape read or just want some of that good old eighties nostalgia!

I was expecting good things from The Carrie Diaries, and I truly was not dissapointed. This has all of the obstacles every teenage girl will be facing today: boyfriends, toxic friends, high school, homework, dreams, ambitions and cliques. To spice things up from the usual novel of teenage angst, it is thrown thirty years into the past to the year 1980. That means big hair, egos and a young Carrie Bradshaw. To embarrass myself and show how juvenile I am, I have to say that I've never watched more than two episodes of Sex and the City nor have I watched the film so I can't really compare old and young Carrie. However, after reading this book, I'm very tempted to give the series a go!

I can't believe how much I loved Carrie. She was so likeable whilst being very headstrong and at the same time a little bit ditzy. She had a wonderful personality and voice, you had a clear sense of who she was. I loved how she had so many dreams and ambitions and had no intentions of giving them up, no matter how many road-blocks she may have to overcome. I can definitely relate to her now and her character. I really, really enjoyed seeing life through her eyes and how she coped with her school friends, her boyfriend(s) and her family issues.

During the book, she is faced with a boy dilemma-not something she's used to. She must choose between bad boy Sebastian and intellect, George. One thing that really bothered me about this book was how Carrie reacted to the two of them. She was completely smitten with Sebastian, doting on his every word no matter how rude he was to her. He was a bad to the bone and she was completely blind to it, even though his arragonce was constantly displayed to her. On the other hand, she liked George but became very angsty towards him when he was being perfectly nice. Carrie was supposed to be a feminist, except she was anything but around Sebastian. I disliked how much of a push-over she was around him and how forgiving she was.

Nevertheless, I fell under the spell of The Carrie Diaries. It's a witty favourite of mine, perfect to be re-read! I definitely reccomend it to fans of the show or to teenagers who've never watched it (like me!). It doesn't matter, you'll love it either way!