This book is the diary of a girl named Shiraz Bailey Wood, she is considered a bit of a chav, but I wouldn't say she is. She's not long into the job before Shizza realises that this celebrity lark isn't all it's cracked up to be. Grace is still grounded for dying her mother's best saucepan purple while customizing denim hot pants when she was a teenager, but she also works as a journalist for The Guardian and Radio Times for whom she recently wrote a phenomenally popular Big Brother blog.

After the nightmare that was Ibiza, Shiraz is overjoyed to be home in Goodmayes, back with her family, her friends. Well if this is your most stunning jewel mate, you ain't got much bling bruv, 'cos this place was a right state and you are a proper liberty sending anyone there. When she's not writing comedy Grace is to be found 'faffing about on the Internet' or 'faffing about in the garden or kitchen' or 'just 'faffing about generally. Dent captures the Chav dialect and cadence (to this American reader, at least) while still making it readable. Assuming 'chav' is Britspeak for 'bogan', just as the aforementioned Aussie comedic icon magnified and lampooned the teenage culture of the western suburbs (Melbourne and Sydney - or my own Hobart's northern), Grace Dent does the same for Greater London.Diva without a Cause is enjoyable enough and may be liked by fans of the more gritty Ballads of Suburbia by Stephanie Kuehnert and The Brothers Torres by Coert Voorhees. The diary format works well for Shiraz's outspoken voice, and I'd recommend it to anyone who likes YA and is looking for a good laugh. Things get tricky when Shiraz ends up getting a job as PA to a Premier league footballer and his wife - Carrie had her heart set on it and she's furious, but how could Shiraz turn it down? That seems to be a big part of Shiraz’s mentality, but unfortunately, that was one of the only real desires I could pinpoint for her character, and getting to the bottom of the “real” Shiraz was an entirely difficult task. Wes and Sooz are finished and it's not long before he's a regular fixture round at 34 Thundersley Road - much to Diane Wood's delight.

Shiraz, Cava-Sue and Murphy are siblings growing up in a rough area of Essex, all attending ‘Superchav Academy’. Written in diary format, I loved Shiraz’s voice, even though the British slang was confusing at times.Besides, as I said before, the strength of this novel looking at the working class in the UK through Shiraz's family.