Thou Shalt Not Dump the Skater Dude (and other commandments I have broken)

Reader reviewed by Grace

Kelsey has just moved to California and is miserable at her new hoity-toity private school where everyone are in cliques and she is outcast. So, when it's time to choose which high school to go to, Kelsey convinces her parents to go to East Bay High, a local high school with trailers for classrooms. There, she gets to know C.J. Logan, the famous skater dude, and eventually becomes known as C.J. Logan's Girlfriend. But Kelsey slowly realizes that skating to C.J. is more important than her, so she breaks up with him. And that is when he starts the rumors about her. Can she overcome them and make over her image at school?

Thou Shalt Not Dump the Skater Dude is a cute and funny story that teaches people a lesson while being entertaining.

Reader reviewed by Ria

Kelsey has just been forced to move all the way from Boston to California during the worst time in her life, the beginning of 8th grade. She completes her year at a prestigious Private all-girls school and realizes that she doesn't want to deal with snotty girls anymore. She decides to go to the public school, where she instantly gets recognized by the school celebrity, skateboarder C.J. Logan. Not long after, she becomes his girlfriend and gets to experience the perks of being popular.

When Kelsey realizes that C.J. isn't putting in enough effort to be a good boyfriend, she dumps him after a year. But there's only one problem, C.J. has never been dumped before. So he spreads rumors about Kelsey around school and makes her miserable. But Kelsey tries to ignore them and becomes interested in the famed school newspaper, the Bee, and puts all her effort into making it as a journalist. When the rumors still affect her life one year later, Kelsey has to do something to stand up for herself before it's too late.

I was surprised at how much I liked this book. While I feel that younger teens would enjoy this book more, it was still entertaining to read. It was refreshing to read about a character like Kelsey. The story was really interesting too, even though the concept of a high school romance is common in many young adult books these days. I'd recommend this book as a fun, easy read to take your mind off things. The ending of the story made me want to know more. I don't know if the author is planning to write a sequel, but I know that I will probably pick up any other book that she writes.