Product Description

Amy feels conflicted when her mother becomes an amah (a nanny) for the perfect Miss Stephanie. While her mother's at work, Amy has to watch her younger brothers and sisters, which means missing ballet practices. Amy wants to be a good daughter, but she also wants to keep her role in the upcoming dance production. Can she find a way to balance family obligations with her desire for independence?

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #1607986 in Books
• Published on: 2001-01-01
• Original language: English
• Dimensions: .30 pounds
• Binding: Mass Market Paperback
• 192 pages

From School Library Journal
Grade 4-7-Life mirrors art when Amy Chin, 12, begins to feel like Cinderella's mean stepsister, the part she is rehearsing in ballet class. Her mother has accepted a job as an Amah, or nanny, which results in increased responsibilities at home for the girl. Feeling resentful, Amy decides she won't like her mother's charge, 12-year-old Stephanie. However, her meeting with the girl and a family heirloom disaster help her realize that Cinderellas aren't always as perfect as they appear and that real magic is the ability to change yourself. A friend's grandmother provides a caring intergenerational relationship as well as information about Chinese culture. Readers will enjoy the ballet references as they explore the universal feelings of jealousy and relationships. A realistic story of a contemporary Chinese-American family with flaws and strengths.
Helen Foster James, University of California at San Diego
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc.

From Booklist
Things have been tough in the Chin household since Amy's father died, but her mother's new job as an amah (nanny) for 12-year-old Stephanie, who is just Amy's age, may help. Unfortunately, it means that Amy must take on more responsibility for the house and her four younger siblings, and that she will have less time to prepare for her role as a wicked stepsister in her ballet school's performance of Cinderella. As it turns out, Amy begins to feel and act like the role she's getting ready for when it appears that sweet, "perfect" Stephanie is trying to take over the Chin family. The strained relationship between Amy and her "old world" mother is one of the strongest elements in this story, which clearly delineates the sort of struggle that can occur between generations in an immigrant family as well as what it feels like to be an outsider, even in your own home. A solid read. Stephanie Zvirin

From Kirkus Reviews
Revisiting characters from The Cook's Family (1998), Yep again explores personal and cultural conflicts arising between the generations in a Chinese-American family. Suddenly saddled with caring for four younger siblings after a wealthy businessman hires her widowed mother as a governessor amahfor his daughter, Stephanie, Amy Chin is forced to miss several ballet rehearsals for Cinderella, to listen to glowing accounts of Stephanie's sophistication, and to accept expensive clothing and other gifts from her. While gaining new insight into how Cinderella's stepsisters must have felt, Amy's understandable resentment is compounded by the news that Stephanie will be moving in while her father is away on a trip. Yep builds that feeling to fever pitch, then dispels it by casting Stephanie as a lonely child hurt by one parent's death and the other's neglect; becoming friends, Stephanie and Amy clear the air and mend some fences with their well-meaning parents in a climactic face-off. The characters, most of them familiar from previous appearances, are distinct if not particularly complex, the San Francisco setting is vividly drawn, and the issues are laid out in plain terms and tidily resolved. It's formulaic, but not entirely superficial. (Fiction. 10-13) -- Copyright ©1999, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.