the boyfriend list, e lockhart (corgi)ruby "roo" oliver got dumped by her boyfriend and then her friends and then started having panic attacks which led to her seeing a therapist and starting 'the boyfriend list' (which caused more problems there for a little while).
this is a great little book, roo is an extremely likable narrator - not unlike that star among stars, the luminous miss georgia nicholson. roo's fifteen, has lunatic parents and a gang of girlfriends and a wide array of young men in her life. over the course of the book we hear about the fifteen most significant boys - who range from kindergarten paramours to imaginary boyfriends to first kisses to friends' brothers to the real deal.
lockhart manages to give roo a voice that rings true, that gets across her self-pity and desperation when she loses not only her boyfriend, but also her three best friends. she (that's lockhart) uses a quirky footnote method to give even more insight into roo's thought processes and to give us a little more info. but as a reader i never got bored or sick of roo's troubles because, while she did feel pretty sorry for herself, she was constantly trying (sometimes unsuccessfully) to see how things might have got so messed up.
this is gorgeous, funny, smart stuff.
Oh, I do love Roo! She's one of my all-time fave characters, and I love the way she grows through the series.
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