After a summer of meeting handsome French boys and getting a tiny bit sunburnt. OK, fine - a lot sunburnt, Lottie's heading off on a week-long residential school trip. A whole week away from embarrassing parents and Toby's tasty air biscuits! My daughter couldn't put it down and read it in 2 days. Read at breakfast, walking downstairs, tea time, in the bath.

So obviously, being in my 30s, I'm not the intended audience for the story of Lottie but I feel working in a primary school, especially in a year 6 class, gives me some insights into their mind. And I want to start this review by saying I think all year six girls should read this book before going to senior school. The message of this book is so important and I really think that age group need to hear it. When Lottie (under the name of Lisa) finds that her father is planning to remarry, she becomes very ill and stops writing to her sister in Munich. Meanwhile, Lottie's mother comes across a picture of the two girls at summer camp, and Lisa tells her the entire story. The girls' mother calls her former husband in Vienna to tell him what has happened and to find out why Lottie has stopped writing. When she hears that her daughter is ill, she and Lisa immediately travel to Vienna. At the daughters' request, the parents are reunited.After the war, Kästner worked the idea into the highly successful book. Subsequently, it has been adapted into film many times, most notably The book originally started out during World War II as an aborted movie scenario. In 1942, when for a brief time Kästner was allowed by the Nazi authorities to work as a screenwriter, he proposed it to Josef von Báky, under the title The Great Secret, but the Nazis once again forbade him to work.

Two nine-year-old girls, bold Lisa Palfy (orig. Luise Palfy) from Vienna and shy Lottie Horn (orig. Lotte Körner) from Munich meet in a summer camp in Bohrlaken on Lake Bohren (orig. 'Seebühl am Bühlsee'), where they discover that they are identical twins whose parents divorced, each keeping one of the girls. In 2014, the novel was translated by Anthea Bell and published in the United Kingdom and Australia by Pushkin Press as The Parent Trap, after the successful Disney films, replacing the previous translation by Cyrus Brooks which is still published in the United States and Canada. Bell's translation is more faithful to the German original in line with the publisher's aim of introducing children to stories from different languages and cultures. Then Lottie meets new CRUSH Antoine. The language is a tiny bit of a barrier but does it matter when he's THAT good looking? She might as well give up now and go into hibernation with her hamsters Sir Barnaby Squeakington and Fuzzball the Third. Lottie Brooks continues to navigate the many perils of growing up in this fantastically funny illustrated series for a 9-12 audience, filled with friendship, embarrassing moments and plenty of lols.But the trip soon turns into a total disaster. The other girls staying at the camp are MEGA-MEAN, best friend Jess is spending all her time with new girl Isha, and Lottie's diary gets stolen! My 9-year-old daughter devoured it in two nights, and all I could hear from her was giggling and the occasional "Mum! Listen to this! This is SO me!".

The first book in the hilarious new series for children by the bestselling creator of Hurrah For Gin. Perfect for fans of Angus, Thongs and Perfect Snogging and Dork Diaries. Her growth through the book is huge and she ends her diary with the message that you shouldn't do anything you don't want to do just because someone tells you to and actually it's okay to just be you. Which I think every preteen (or tween as some in my class like to be referred as!) needs to hear. She openly discusses what her body is going through (or not going through) during puberty and comparing it to everyone else. From an adult point of view, I liked how her mum talked about it with her and celebrated her changing body and didn't make her feel like it was something to feel shameful about. We need more body positive talk! Disney's 1961 film The Parent Trap starring Hayley Mills, the subsequent film series, and their various translations.

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The character of Lottie is so relatable too. I know I'm years away from my own childhood but my memories are pretty strong. I know all too well the realities of so called 'popular girls' (although in my school it was actually both the girls and the boys who were equally mean) making fun of me for the slightest thing. And although this is a humorous book that had me laughing out loud in some places, there were also some emotional moments where Lottie is crying in bed. The girls decide to swap places at the end of the summer so that Lottie will have a chance to get to know her father and Lisa will get to meet her mother. While many adults are surprised at the changes in each of the girls after they return from camp ("Lottie" has apparently forgotten how to cook, gets in a fight at school, and becomes a terrible student, while "Lisa" has begun to keep a close eye on the housekeeper's bookkeeping, will no longer eat her favorite food, and becomes a model student), no one suspects that the girls are not who they claim to be. Lisa and Lottie (original German title: Das doppelte Lottchen, "The Double Lottie") (published since 2014 in the United Kingdom and Australia as The Parent Trap) is a 1949 German novel by Erich Kästner, about twin girls separated in infancy who meet at summer camp.