Lizzie Logan, Second Banana

From School Library Journal Grade 2-4?Lizzie Logan, from Lizzie Logan Gets Married (1997) and Lizzie Logan Wears Purple Sunglasses (1995, both S & S) is as sassy as ever as she now copes with her mother's pregnancy. She also prepares for the Little Miss Seafood Pageant, a contest she enters in order to win money to buy a telescope. Through Lizzie's best friend Heather's narrative, Spinelli allows her heroine to come blazing through as she races from one crisis to another, barely noticing the chaos in her wake or the effect of her behavior on Heather's life. Lizzie's in-your-face attitude and her seemingly fearlessness mask her insecurities about winning, being popular, and being loved when the new baby arrives. Although this is not a complex story, it deals with the vagaries of family life and friendship with great humor and compassion. A good lead-in to Lois Lowry's books about Anastasia Krupnik (Houghton).