Fake Me A Match by Lauren Barnholdt

Title/Author: Fake Me A Match by Lauren Barnholdt
Publisher/Date published: Aladdin, October 4th 2011
How I got this book: received it from the publisher as an egalley

Goodreads summary: "Avery LaDuke is in the market for a new best friend. Her former BFF, Sophie Burns, dumped her to hang out with the popular crowd at school. But the good news Avery's getting a new sister who's bound to be her new BFF too! Blake is her age and she's from New York. How cool is that? But things don't go quite as smoothly as Avery hoped. And what's with Blake becoming BFFs with Sophie? Huh?? That wasn’t supposed to happen!
When Avery gets put in charge of the eighth grade charity project, an on-line matchmaking service, she thinks she can use this project to get Blake back on her side. She decides to fix the matches so that Blake gets matched with Sam, the most popular boy in school, but when the matches come out something has gone seriously wrong! Not only is Avery matched with Sam, but the class advisor knows that someone tampered with the program. On top of that, Avery discovers that she actually kind of, sort of, likes Sam... and he likes her back. Torn between the guy she likes and her sister/best friend, Avery is left wondering: is there any possible way she can keep them both?"

I SO loved Avery! Avery is such a wonderful girl! She's nice and selfless and she so wants to be liked! She truly believes that because Blake is going to be her stepsister, they will be insta-best friends and I was so rooting for her that everything was gonna work out! She manages to land herself in some funny situations and well, this girl is just awesome.

Avery was so scared of loosing Blake as a friend that she denies herself the opportunity to be with the boy she likes. I don't think my 13-year-old self would have done that.

One other thing I loved about this book: Avery and Blake were both (mostly) ok with the fact their parents were getting married. There was no evil step-whatever going on. Things that went wrong weren't caused by spite, HOORAY for this!

Sam was adorable, really. He sounds like a boy 13-year-old me would have fallen head over heels for and I loved the boyness of him. He turns out to be such a sweetie!

Anyway, this was such a CUTE read! I really enjoyed the other novel I read by Lauren Barnholdt: Sometimes It Happens, and this one convinced me it's not a one-hit-wonder. I think I've found me a new author for my favourites list :)

My rating: 4,5 stars