The Dirt Diary by Anna Staniszweski

Publisher:Sourcebooks Jabberwocky
Date: January 7th 2014
Page: 256
Source: Publisher
Age Range: Young Adult

Rachel can'tbelieve she has to give up her Saturdays to scrubbing other people's toilets. So. Gross. But she kinda, sorta stole $287.22 from her college fund that she's got to pay back ASAP or her mom will ground her for life. Which is even worse than working for her mother's new cleaning business. Maybe. After all, becoming a maid is definitely not going to help her already loserish reputation.

But Rachel picks up more than smell socks on the job. As maid to some of the most popular kids in school, Rachel suddenly has all the dirt on the 8th grade in-crowd. Her formerly boring diary is now filled with juicy secrets. And when her crush offers to pay her to spy on his girlfriend, Rachel has to decide if she's willing to get her hands dirty.

The Dirt Diary was high on my want-to-read list as I loved the synopsis and the pretty cover. Did it live up my expectations? More than a very big YES!
This book was so funny and this is the kind of book that cheers you up instantly! What is more than a nightmare then being the maid of the popular and meanest people at school? It happens to Rachel, who was such a fun and brave main character. The story is light and breezy, with a believable friendship and lighthearted tween romance. But there are heavier themes here—that of divorce and the acceptance of a disappointing parent—which felt so authentic that I actually teared up in places. I didn't expect the queen bee to be so cruelly mean. Every day Briana tortures Rachel, who has to clean Briana's room, with putting junk on her floor, in the end even glass snippers when the tension between Briana and Rachel has its peak point. But cleaning Briana's house means also that she becomes on the good side with Briana's brother and she becomes friend with the person she expected the least to become friends with. This is a  middle grade/YA novel full of fun and unexpected twists, and exciting plot and the best main and side characters.Definitely recommended for tween fans of realistic fiction with a wink.