My Life in Pink and Green (Pink and Green Series #1)

by Lisa Greenwald

Overview

Lisa Greenwald’s My Life in Pink & Green is the first book in a series that “successfully delivers an authentic and endearing portrait of the not-quite-teen experience” (Kirkus Reviews, Starred Review).

Twelve-year-old Lucy Desberg is a natural problem-solver. At her family’s struggling pharmacy, she has a line of makeover customers for every school dance and bat mitzvah. But all the makeup tips in the world won’t help save the business. If only she could find a way to make it the center of town again—a place where people want to spend time, like in the old days.

Lucy dreams up a solution that could resuscitate the family business and help the environment, too. But will Lucy’s family stop fighting long enough to listen to a seventh grader?

In this “warm, uplifting debut” (Booklist), readers everywhere have responded to Lucy’s independence and initiative—not to mention her great style.

Pink & Green series:
My Life in Pink & Green (#1)
My Summer of Pink & Green (#2)
Pink & Green Is the New Black (#3)

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780810989849
Publisher:	Amulet Paperbacks
Publication date:	09/01/2010
Series:	Pink and Green Series , #1
Pages:	288
Sales rank:	394,387
Product dimensions:	5.50(w) x 8.20(h) x 0.80(d)
Age Range:	10 - 14 Years

About the Author

Lisa Greenwald is the author of Welcome to Dog Beach, Reel Life Starring Us, Sweet Treats & Secret Crushes, and the Pink & Green series. She works in the library at the Birch Wathen Lenox School in Manhattan. She is a graduate of The New School’s MFA program in writing for children and lives in Brooklyn.

Editorial Reviews

Displaying a lively familiarity with the topics of makeup, makeovers and adolescent angst, Greenwald makes a bright debut with this timely story. Prospects look grim for the Old Mill Pharmacy run by 12-year-old Lucy's mother and grandmother. In order to drum up more sales, Lucy decides to offer customers beauty tips and free makeup applications. Although her efforts prove somewhat fruitful, her best idea comes after she joins her school's earth club: what if they add an eco-spa to the pharmacy? Like the recent Teashop Girls, also about an enterprising preteen trying to save a family business, this novel takes an upbeat approach to serious issues-money struggles and impending foreclosure-underscoring the optimistic message that one individual can make a difference. Ages 10-14. (Mar.)

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Publishers Weekly

Gr 4-6

Lucy Desberg, 12, spends most of her free time at her family's pharmacy. It was once a popular hangout for fountain treats in their small Connecticut town, but the emergence of a large chain store has put the pharmacy in danger of foreclosure. Lucy overhears her practical grandmother and somewhat disengaged, eco-activist mom arguing about what to do, and she is determined to come up with a solution. When the high school's Homecoming queen rushes in sporting a hair disaster on the day of the big dance, Lucy bravely suggests how to fix the problem. A star is born when the products she suggests work, word spreads of Lucy's talents, and more and more young women seek her advice. Meanwhile, she and her older sister apply for a grant to be awarded by the mayor to locally owned businesses that are "going green." Greenwald has created a smart, spunky heroine with ingenuity and budding femininity. A natural beauty or business tip introduces each chapter. These helpful hints are age appropriate and environmentally current. Readers will enjoy the realistic portrayal of middle school friendships, crushes, and coming-of-age beauty concerns.-D. Maria LaRocco, Cuyahoga Public Library, Strongsville, OH

School Library Journal

When 12-year old Lucy learns the family pharmacy might close, she decides to attract customers using her preternatural knowledge of make-up application and products. When not giving the homecoming queen lip-gloss advice and booking appointments, Lucy helps her best friend Sunny deal with the many mini-mortifications of a first crush. The squeals, giggles and tiffs between these best buds teetering on adolescence allow readers a glimpse of true tweendom. Boys still seem mysterious, like aliens, and to Lucy they remain more annoying than infatuating. Preteens will enjoy Lucy's sweet first-person narrative, a disarming combination of innocence and earnestness. She feels sick of adults patronizing her and treating her like a little kid, particularly her flaky mom and no-nonsense grandma. A Going Green grant for local businesses seems a perfect way to make the pharmacy relevant again and prove that she should be taken seriously. Greenwald clearly takes preteens seriously, emphasizing their ardent concern for the environment and desire for change. This refreshing novel successfully delivers an authentic and endearing portrait of the not-quite-teen experience. (Fiction. 9-13)

Kirkus Reviews