Charmed Thirds

From Publishers Weekly This funny, sympathetic installment in Jessica Darling's story ( Sloppy Firsts and Second Helpings ) picks up the summer after her freshman year at Columbia University. The precocious Jersey girl, now a savvy city slicker, has picked a major (psychology), landed an internship at a hip Brooklyn magazine and managed to stay together with her high school boyfriend, reformed bad boy Marcus Flutie, for the entire school year. McCafferty follows Jessica through three years of college, chronicling her academic and extracurricular endeavors, her romantic and financial woes, all in Jessica's frank, exuberant voice. While she kisses a Republican, lusts after hot Spanish grad student Bastian and ventures a clumsy hookup with dormmate Kieran, Jessica expends a lot of energy agonizing over her long-distance relationship with Marcus, now a student at an unaccredited Buddhist university in California. The snappy writing, au courant wordplay (e.g., Jessica affectionately dubs indie-rock boys "bright-eyed, death-cab cuties") and easy-to-relate-to plot turns will keep eager teensand teens-at-heartturning the pages, but designating a high school romance as the novel's primary engine leaves the story stagnant. (Apr.) From School Library Journal Adult/High SchoolJessica Darling is back. She is now attending Columbia University and is still in love with her high school boyfriend, Marcus Flutie. But Marcus is going to a Buddhist college in California, so they don't get to see one another very often. As perhaps befits a college student, Jessica has gotten a lot franker about sex, and about life in general, after some time on her own. She ages from a freshman to a graduate; gets an internship at an outwardly hip, but actually dysfunctional magazine; makes (and loses) new friends; and even plans to move in with a guy. She also comes to terms with her parents and her sister. She loves Marcus and wants to stay true, but still finds herself in wildly inappropriate hookupswith a punk Republican, with a married man, and with an ex-boyfriend. Several of Jessica's old flames and acquaintances reappearMcCafferty has developed a world of characters from Pineville, NJ, who are all changing and growing in believable (but often surprising) ways. Jessica has matured, and in some ways her lovable neuroses have turned darkershe now has more in common with other 20-something chick-lit heroines. Fans of the first two books will be a ready-made audience for this one. Jamie Watson, Harford County Public Library, MD