Cohn, Rachel. Gingerbread. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2002. The book Gingerbread, was a great book that I really enjoyed reading. The main character in this book was a teenage girl named Cyd Charisse. She had this doll named Gingerbread who could talk and communicate with her. She had just gotten home from a fancy boarding school that her mom, Nancy and her step dad, Cyd, had sent her to. Cyd Charisse had gotten kicked out of the boarding school. Syd Charisse and her mom do not get along very well at all, but Cyd gets along great with her step dad. Cyd Charisse currently has a boyfriend in this book named Shrimp. She says that she and Shrimp are in love. But she secretly has a crush on Shrimp's older brother named Java. He owns a coffee shop on the poor side of town. Cyd Charisse gets a job there, not like she needs the money because her family is very wealthy. Since Cyd Charisse and her mother do not get along very well at all, Nancy thinks that since Cyd Charisse has always wanted to meet her real dad, that she will send her to visit him for the remainder of the summer. Cyd Charisse does not want to leave Shrimp, but they get in a fight right before she had to leave because Cyd was grounded and never got to see him any more. When she gets to her dad's, she learns that her dad looks exactly like her and that he is not a very interesting person to be with and she also learns that her father is always caught up in his job and can't find the time to be with her. Her dad has hired a young man to drive Cyd Charisse everywhere and to be with her whenever she feels lonely. Cyd soon meets her step brother named Danny. Cyd gets a job working with Danny because he owns a little coffee shop and Cyd knows how to work like that. It takes a while for Cyd Charisse's step sister to realize that it is not Cyd's fault that her dad, Frank had an affair with Cyd's mom. Cyd finally meets her older sister named Rhonda, but they all call her Lisabeth. She doesn't really like her at first because she just doesn't really seem like a nice person. But then they grow close and learn to love and trust each other. When Cyd finally goes back home, she lets her mom know about all the stuff that has happened in her past that Nancy knew nothing about. Cyd Charisse doing this has made her and her mother a lot closer. Cyd changed a lot when she went to stay with her father, but all in a good way. Her and Shrimp eventually made up and they are back together now. The thing I liked most about this book was how it in some way can probably relate to every teenage girl. It is a great book and I definitely recommend it to teenage girls, not so much boys though.