Charlotte Alice Katherine Enright (who prefers to be called Charlie) is a 11-year-old girl who lives in a small flat with her mother, Jo. Charlie's very happy and has lots of friends, although some of the boys do call her CAKE because of the initials of her name!

The Lottie Project begins on the first day of term when Charlie's class gets a new teacher, Miss Beckworth. Charlie immediately dislikes her because she's really strict. Worse than that, she insists on calling Charlie "Charlotte" and forces her to sit next James Edwards. He's the most intelligent boy in the class and Charlie hates him.

Miss Beckworth asks the class to do a history project about the Victorians. Charlie thinks it's going to be boring until she finds a picture of an 11-year-old Victorian servant girl who looks just like her. Charlie decides what her project will be: she'll explain the life of this little girl, Lottie, by writing a diary.

Charlie enjoys finding out about Lottie, but unfortunately her mum loses her job as a shop assistant and has to get a new job as a cleaner, which means much less money for the two of them. Jo has to clean in a supermarket, but also starts cleaning people's houses. One of the people she cleans for is a single father called Mark, who asks Jo if she'd like to earn some extra money by looking after his young son, Robin. Jo agrees and it's not long before Jo and Mark fall in love – but Charlie's not at all happy about it...

The Lottie Project is a great mixture of modern and Victorian life – the similarities and the differences. I really enjoyed the story and found it more light-hearted than some of Jacqueline Wilson's other books. And even if you think you're not that interested in reading about Charlie's Victorian project, I'm sure you will be by the end of the story!

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