The Aristobratsby Jennifer SolowThis was an extremely cute and fun middle grade novel. I say middle grade since the girls are all entering the 8th grade and I think that's middle school for anyone outside of Quebec, right? (High school here is 7-11.)The book actually reminded me of the movie Clueless from the 1990s, what with all the generation-specific lingo and whatnot. This is the one problem I had with the book. As much as Clueless makes me laugh I HATE the language in the movie. I think everyone sounded like a moron and I can't stand "hip" lingo. This book has today's Young People Lingo down pat and it makes me SO. ANGRY. It also makes me feel VERY OLD.I sort of wanted to smack these brats with my non-existent Old Person Cane (which I am so looking forward to having in the future. I am going to make an awesome crotchety old person! GET OFF MY LAWN YOU WHIPPERSNAPPERS!! *shakes cane*)I hated these girls. These are the girls that books normally scrunch into the Mean Girls category. They are bratty and shallow and you are suddenly immersed in their world as they are knocked down a few rungs on the Populadder (how much do I love that word!). You are expected to feel sympathy for them (I think) and care about how they do not get the choice seats in the assembly room. What is the world coming to?!?! OMG!The thing is, I did sort of sympathize with some of them. I ended up truly liking Parker because she was more that just popular and pretty. I very much liked Ikea (pronounced I-KAY-a) and how she turned the crisis of not being the most popular into figuring out more about herself.My dislike of the language and shallow-ness is obviously a personal thing. It in no way reflects how I feel about the book, because I think it added to the portrayal of the characters and what was going on in the story. I just really, really, REALLY hate the way the Young People talk and act these days. All that texting and focus on updating facebook profiles to have the latest and bestest applications and who has the most friends. Gah!I am so old and crotchety and I'm only just in my early 30s! This does not bode well for the rest of my adult life. Ugh.I want to read more by Jennifer Solow soon! I loved how simple yet engaging her writing was and how quickly I was able to be drawn into the life of a bratty, shallow Wally. ;)Thanks so much to the author and her publisher for sending me this book. It's certainly something I will be keeping to corrupt my niece with when she's older (she's only 4 now and I don't want to corrupt her TOO soon because then I won't like her very much. ;))