Love, Peace and Chocolate

by Cathy Cassidy

Wishes...secrets... a tender-hearted story about friendship which is sure to ring true with all Cathy Cassidy fans.

Genres: Childrens, Contemporary, Teen, Middle Grade, Short Stories, Young Adult, Romance

80 pages, Paperback

First published May 6, 2010

About the author

I was born in 1962 in Coventry (scarily ancient, I know). I wrote my first picture book for my little brother when I was eight or nine. I loved making comics, too - pages and pages of picture stories, features and competitions.

I went to Art College in Liverpool, then got a job as fiction editor on the fab and legendary Jackie magazine.

I have worked as agony aunt on Shout magazine and also as an art teacher in the local primary & secondary schools, as well as as a freelance illustrator. These days, I am a full-time author.

I love my family, I love living in the middle of nowhere and I love my work. Of all my jobs, writing has to be the best - it's the perfect excuse to daydream, after all!

Reviews

[Sara · Rating 4 out of 5]

Love,Peace and Chocolate is a lovely story about friendship. Jess and Kady have been best friends forever. At their school absolutely no boy is the boyfriends type. That's until Jack Somers arrives. They both fall for him along with the rest of the girls in the school. They are both after him. At first they think no boy can come between them but then Jack kisses Kady and starts dating her and Jess becomes jealous. She tries to hid it but when Kady goes on and on about him she explodes. They have a fight and stop being friends. Then one day Jess hangs out with Jack and he kisses her even though he's still dating Kady. She knows its wrong and turns away. She tries to tell Kady but she won't listen. Then one day at theur school Peace Festival Kady sees him with his arms around another girl and she runs to the toilets and starts crying. Jess sees what she saw when she tries to make up with Kady and finds her in the toilets. They make up and admit they both missed each other. After Kady finishes crying they go out and realise white lanterns with wishes on them. Jess's wish comes true she gets her BFF back. This book rocks it makes us realise that no boy deserves to reck a friendship. After all it's Besties Before Boys!

[Damien Malcolm · Rating 3 out of 5]

This is a nice little book, for the most part. And while I somewhat enjoyed reading it to my children, I have to say either I'm a little out of touch with what tween girls are doing nowadays (which is likely) or this book has just a couple of small things that are borderline inappropriate for young people. I mean, shouldn't our goal be to un-sexualise young girls nowadays? We're battling the likes of gloss mags and music videos, teaching our kids how to grow up too fast, stay scary thin and sell their sexual prowess before they have any, and here I am skipping a paragraph in a book intended for 10-12yr old girls because one of the 12yr old female main characters is wearing a thong under her short skirt/shorts, trying to impress a boy. A thong? Really? I have an eleven year old son; he wouldn't even know what that is, or its connotation. And planting the idea in a 12yr old reader's head that wearing a g-string is how she should go about attracting a boy's attention should be frowned upon a little, shouldn't it? Not to mention teaching boys to bypass the person and just look at her underwear. I'm sorry if you don't agree, but I found it a little confronting when reading what I thought was just a nice and innocent friendship story to my kids. And while I really did like the over-arching theme of believing in and striving to maintain true friendship, I found some sections just a little too grown up for the intended audience. Sorry if that sounds prudish for this "modern day society".

[Alice (Children's Books Librarian) · Rating 3 out of 5]

3.5 stars

A short novella about two best friends Jess and Kady, who are practically joined at the hip until a new boy arrives to their school which threatens to derail their connection. Told in prose and text messages, this is suitable for readers 11+ and is a good introduction to Cathy's writing style.

[Samara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Rtc

[em · Rating 4 out of 5]

Cathy Cassidy was my sister's favourite author when she was my age and I see why. I loved this so much!!

[Ligaya · Rating 3 out of 5]

deep down i wished na the girls would stop fighting over a boy and kiss instead

[Natasha B · Rating 3 out of 5]

This book is one which I was obsessed with at the age of about 12. I re-read it this year just for the memories and to see if it was as good as I remembered. My conclusion is that this book is a great read for girls between the age of eleven and fourteen. Reading this book nowit was not relatable for me currenly but I could see more similarities between younger me and the main characters then can be counted on one hand. The slight comedic aspects were on point. I can also appreciate the moral of this book ; friendship is more important then love. I marked this as 3 stars because well I wouldn't say I loved it now but for younger audiences I would strongly reccomend.

EDIT: Other people pointed this out to me and I would also like to mention this. The book is problematic in the fact where there are a couple sexualising scenes of the young girls. For example one of them wears a thong to school to impress a guy. There are only brief mentions of these things but this makes it not approriate reading for very young children. Additionally although it is okay for women to come into their sexuality and dress how they please, the age of 12 is too young to be doing this and the fact that girls are represented as doing this indicates a larger problem of the sexualisation of women.

[Emily | Emmeline's Books · Rating 3 out of 5]

Love, Peace and Chocolate is a short story by UK author, Cathy Cassidy. I purchased this book many years ago and decided to pick it for my first read of 2017. The books follows the friendship between Kady and Jess, two long time best friends, whose friendship ultimately becomes tested when Jack Somers is the new student at their school. I love it when authors reference the title of the story within the book, and Cassidy manages this perfectly. This book is a short easy read and is well suited to middle grade readers.

[Ghada · Rating 2 out of 5]

A pre Teen Book.

If you are between 10-15 and was looking for a light read .. Then I recommend this book.

Honestly I chose this book because it was the shortest one. I actually liked it.
It was cute in a way, though Cathy didn't go in depth or about the relationship.


Cathy just makes everything better <3

[Ilonita50 · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very quick read. Reading the book, its nice to return to age when i was 12-15 lets say, and this love story is good, funny and lets say a bit tragic, how two friends fell for one guy..its cool to adore together and chat and chat about one guy, but when you want to be together with that one guy, than you want him to be only yours...:)

[Priya · Rating 4 out of 5]

This is a heart touching fast read. When to best friends fight over one boy they are both in love with, I love message it gives to us all that young teen girls don't need a boyfriends to be happy :) the only thing is when you read it is quite predictable

[Spaghetti · Rating 5 out of 5]

It was a very good book although it was a short. Cathy is a wonderful author I hope I read all her books because they are beautiful!

[Cupcake Girl · Rating 3 out of 5]

A good book? yes.
All the same ingrediantsthat make a cathy cassidy book half the pages!

[Ailsa S.]

AMAZING

[The Mad Hatter · Rating 4 out of 5]

It was a bit too short.It was good though

[Candycloud · Rating 4 out of 5]

A quick read, but fun and cute.

[Leah · Rating 5 out of 5]

love Funny
Peace and = chearfull and
chocolate clever

[Amme Bwalya · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quite a good quick read, I have to admit it made me a little tearfull in places but overall it was great. A typical Cathy Cassidy story ( not saying it was predictable). Quite touching too.

[Chloe · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this a few times around the age of twelve. A sweet story about friendship :). A light and fluffy read. I always turn to Cathy Cassidy books to get me out of a slump

[Malak]

it is a funny story

[Ciara · Rating 3 out of 5]

Quite short, but a good plot overall.

[Darcie Gray · Rating 2 out of 5]

too short, wasn't really worth the read :/