It’s Kind of a Cheesy Love Story

Gr 8 Up–Beck Brix has been known as the Pizza Princess or the Hot & Crusty Bathroom Baby ever since she was unceremoniously born in the bathroom of the local pizza parlor—at which point the owner offered her free pizza for life and a guaranteed job when she turned 16. It’s a destiny that Beck has been trying to escape her whole life, especially when she falls in with the popular crowd at her high school. How will being the Pizza Princess, or her obsession with a vintage sci-fi show, help her catch the eye of her baseball star crush? Or help her to avoid the snide remarks of the queen bee of their group? But when Beck turns 16 with no other job offers on the horizon, she reluctantly starts work at Hot & Crusty, only to discover that it’s one of the few places where she can truly be herself. As Beck begins to make friends with the Hot & Crusty crew, she finds herself drawn to Tristan, the broody delivery boy. This is, as the title describes, kind of a cheesy love story. Though there’s not much groundbreaking about the book, it hits all of the familiar romantic comedy notes with a good deal of warmth and heart. The majority of the cast appears to be white, except Tristan, who is biracial.