Rating: 
Summary: Not what I expected, but more...
Review: I expected this to be standard chick lit (girl meets boy, girl frets, girl hits bars with friends, girl frets, girl gets boy) but it wasn't; it was just what the title suggests - the fictional diary of an American au pair living with a Scottish family. Melissa's romantic problems barely come into play in the novel at all. Instead, the book focuses on Melissa's interaction with the family and on how her relationship with each member of the family progresses the longer she stays with them.
Other reviewers have complained that the book seems to lack a story or a plot - I would argue that many of the the experiences Melissa has come across as vignettes. Like any diary, not everything is always connected. Personally, I liked that. I also really enjoyed the character of Melissa who was a pushover but was conscious of that fact and trying not to be.
The author has great skill as description - you really get a very clear sense of the places and people in the story.
I thoroughly enjoyed this book.
Rating: 
Summary: Outdated and detached...
Review: I guess after reading The Nanny Diaries, which I liked, I expected this book to be similar. It wasn't. Melissa, an American, goes to England to work as an au pair for the Haig- Ereildoun family after loosing her job and calling off her wedding. The writing style is strange (it's not written in a diary format) and it seemed like it was happening many years ago...I actually couldn't tell the exact time period it was set in. There really is no plot, so it's hard to describe it much further. The only thing I did like was the whole culture shock Melissa went through. That's about it.
Rating:
Summary: Boring Read
Review: I had high hopes for this novel, but it failed to spark my interest. Originally published as Do Try to Speak as We Do, The Diary of an American Au Pair comes across as a guide to British terminology. Thus the former title is better suited for this novel. The novel is centered on the culture shock Melissa experiences when she moves from San Francisco to work as an au pair for an aristocratic family in Scotland. From then on, Melissa chronicles her misadventures with the Haig-Ereildouns family - most of which is centered on the cultural differences between Americans and the British. There are some amusing moments, but not enough to make it interesting. I recommend The Nanny Diaries instead.
Rating: 
Summary: Not What I Expected
Review: I usually give books a 50 page test. If I am bored after 50 pages, I put the book down and slowly back away. Sadly, this book was one of THOSE books. I just couldn't interest myself in the story. Now, I am one of those american's who devour just about anything british,(um... hence, the name...) but even that aspect of the book couldn't keep me reading. I was bored and couldn't have cared less about the characters. I hate to give a bad review, but if you are searching for something in the lighthearted, chick lit category, this is not what you are looking for.
Rating:
Summary: More Intelligent Reading Than Most Standard Chick Lit
Review: Loving chick lit intelligent novels I tend to switch up my reading from time to time. Choosing this novel because it clearly looks like a modern chick lit read I was surprised to see that it had a clever and highly intelligent way about it. The main character wasn't ditzy nor overbearing she seemed real and going through a crisis of her own that needed managing and understanding. It was fun reading about the comparisons of the English way of life and our own here in America. A quick read with some interesting prose.
Rating: 
Summary: A good read and you learn a little about life in the UK, too
Review: Many of the other reviewers are off base on this one. This is an enjoyable "chick lit" read and you actually learn something as well. While there is a little bit of the typical focus of this genre on the boyfriend/marriage chase, the reader also learns quite a bit about how the landed class live in the UK. I preferred the author's empathy to her charges over the high level of disdain for everyone that is the hallmark of the Nanny Diaries. I thoroughly enjoyed this book and think that the next time I go to the UK I will have a little more appreciation for the country and its people.
Rating: 
Summary: My daughter's diary is more interesting
Review: Melissa is the nanny for the Haig-Ereildoun family. She left San Francisco after losing her job and canceling her wedding to Tedward. Tedward? She fled to England and now is the family's nanny/servant, always an the verge of making yet another wrong step. The relationship between Melissa and the three children of the Haig-Ereildoun family is the strongest part of this book. Other than that, it is all a jumble. Her relationship with her ex-fiancee is hard to figure out(and he is a really annoying character). The Haig-Ereildoun adults are odd, as are
their friends. There is a nasty bit of interaction between Melissa and one of the family's young nephews, very disturbing. Characters pop in and out and the story meanders on and on. iI kept thinking the story would develop, or that i would eventually care about the characters....never happened!Melissa waffles between staying and going. Go already! This was initially published as "Please Try to Speak as We Do",which I read several years ago. It was as annoying a read this time around.
Rating:
Summary: My daughter's diary is more interesting
Review: Melissa is the nanny for the Haig-Ereildoun family. She left San Francisco after losing her job and canceling her wedding to Tedward. Tedward? She fled to England and now is the family's nanny/servant, always an the verge of making yet another wrong step. The relationship between Melissa and the three children of the Haig-Ereildoun family is the strongest part of this book. Other than that, it is all a jumble. Her relationship with her ex-fiancee is hard to figure out(and he is a really annoying character). The Haig-Ereildoun adults are odd, as are
their friends. There is a nasty bit of interaction between Melissa and one of the family's young nephews, very disturbing. Characters pop in and out and the story meanders on and on. iI kept thinking the story would develop, or that i would eventually care about the characters....never happened!Melissa waffles between staying and going. Go already! This was initially published as "Please Try to Speak as We Do",which I read several years ago. It was as annoying a read this time around.
Rating:
Summary: Boring Read
Review: No matter how bad a book is I usually read all the way through in hopes that it will get better. This one doesn't. The cover of the book says it's a novel but there is no plot and no storyline. The cover of the book also says it's a diary and that is exactly what it is, the main character's diary of what she experienced as a nanny in England. All this book really contains is descriptions. Descriptions of the color of the walls, the décor in the bedroom, a cooking class, endless description of food and letters mailed home. The characters in the book are so poorly developed that you just don't care about them. That includes the main character, Melissa, who comes across as needy and spineless. She has a fiancé back home whom she loves but doesn't want him to come visit for fear he'll embarrass her with his "terrible language and his hicklike manners." And then there's Simon, a lab nerd who takes her on a date to see monkey's mate. Which man will she choose? Who cares? Neither of them sound like a catch. The author attempts to bring some sort of rising conflict into to story and then fails to develop it. Throughout the story you get the sense that the children Melissa are caring for are good, well-behaved children. Then three-fourths of the way into the book we are told that one of the children is actually "very, very naughty." We are never told why and are left wondering. Also, Melissa was suppose to married the fiancé back home but called off the wedding. We are only told there was a "problem" and that was never explained. The only way I would recommend this book would be if you were stranded on a desert island and had absolutely nothing else to read.
Rating:
Summary: great characters
Review: This book seems to have suffered from bad marketing. No, it's not a light breezy chick-lit read as the cover art and blurb would lead you to believe, but in my opinion it was much better than the over-hyped Nanny Diaries. When it starts out I thought it was going to be another whiny narrator and a cartoonish evil boss, but I think it ended up to be much more than that. She makes the characters very full and human, and even the nasty mother is not over the top, and not far off from some of the English women I've known personally. This is how real people are--not saintly and not completely evil. I really grew to care about the people in this book and wanted everything to work out for them. As for some of the complaints here--I think the whole point of Melissa's problem was that she did have a fiancee back home that she didn't know very well, and it's very realistic that she could come to like some of the people who she initially didn't like. I think Melissa is just more open minded and forgiving than most. And at least she did eventually tell her employer off, not like the unsatisfying and ridiculously self-serving end of the Nanny Diaries. I am not a big lit fiction fan but I really enjoyed this book. I think it would have been served better by more honest marketing.
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