Annie B., Made for TV by Amy Dixon
Released: June 5th 2018
Format: Kindle
Publisher: Running Press
Source: NetGalley
Eleven-year-old Annie Brown is used to being on the losing end of comparisons to her almost-always best friend Savannah. Savannah is MVP of the track team, has straight As, and, predictably, wins the most coveted school spirit award on the last day of 5th grade.
Of course, things don’t happen quite according to plan, and soon Annie is worried about losing both the opportunity she’s been training for her whole life, and her best friend.
A BIG Thank You to NetGalley for providing me an advanced reader’s copy of “Annie B., Made for TV” by Amy Dixon in exchange for my honest review.
I liked this book. True, is it not a game changer of any sort, but it is a charming middle grade story of friendship, and shows how the main character, Annie reacts when her friendship with her best friend Savannah starts sinking and how she tries to mend it.
I thought this book touched on an interesting subject on how we feel and respond to our friends when we are faced with certain situations. We all have close friends whom we look up to and aspire to be like. Sometimes, when we see them be successful in things that we fail to be successful at, it make us angry or jealous at them, rather than be supportive. I liked how the story touched on this idea and showed how Annie reacted to the circumstances when she saw Savannah stealing her spotlight. I know a lot of us have had best friends whom we are not close with as time goes on, so reading books like these reminds me that we should really cherish the people who are close in our lives that we consider as good friends and family, and not let emotions like jealousy get in the way. After all, like how the author mentions in the story:
“Good friends are like stars. You can’t always see them, but you know they’re always there.”
The only part that I slightly got tired of was reading all the sales ads that Annie comes up throughout the book. At first, it was fun to read these quirky advertisement ideas that she creates, but after a while, it just got monotonous, and I just wanted to focus on the story. It would have been fun if the way each advertisement sounded was different from one another, but they were all portrayed in the same manner, and at times seemed like unnecessary fillers added to the book.
The style of writing is simple and the pacing is easy to follow. Overall, this was a very cute book that a middle grader would enjoy. However, as much as I liked it, I am giving it only 3 stars as I feel like the characters were not that memorable, and more often than not, I did get tired of the “advertisements” ideas.
