Tzi­po­ra Stein is smart and stu­dious. Ric­ki Polter is the pret­ti­est, nas­ti­est, and of course, the most pop­u­lar girl in the class. When Tzi­po­ra receives a cov­et­ed invi­ta­tion to one of Ricki’s get-togeth­ers, Tzi­po­ra should be thrilled. But she isn’t, this friend­ship comes at a high cost. Now in sixth grade, Ric­ki wants Tzi­po­ra to let her copy the answers off her tests. The con­se­quences of cheat­ing and bul­ly­ing, as well as the tri­umph of nice girls over mean, are the themes of Leah Subar’s Copy­cat, a nov­el for young read­ers. Tzi­po­ra, des­per­ate for friends, is at first will­ing to do any­thing. Soon, it is clear that Ricki’s friend­ship is a curse. Ric­ki is divi­sive and ridicules even her clos­est friends. Almost imme­di­ate­ly, the read­er knows Tzi­po­ra will be faced with bad choic­es. The long­ing for friend­ship and inclu­sion is pow­er­ful at this age. The premise of this sto­ry is believ­able, and the read­er under­stands Tzipora’s moti­va­tion, even though we can antic­i­pate the pit­falls. But because the char­ac­ters are so stereo­typ­i­cal — either com­plete­ly good or evil — the plot turns feel didac­tic and pre­dictable. The nar­ra­tive and dia­logue, writ­ten in mater­nal and pro­tec­tive voic­es, feels old-fash­ioned, under­min­ing the very con­flicts it strives to cre­ate. That said, for younger read­ers, the easy tri­umph at the novel’s con­clu­sion will pro­vide reas­sur­ance. Bul­ly­ing is a wor­thy dis­cus­sion top­ic, and this nov­el can start a use­ful class­room con­ver­sa­tion. For a more real­is­tic inter­pre­ta­tion of these con­flicts, read­ers this age should check out Amy Gold­man Koss’ The Girls and The Cheat. For ages 9 – 12.