So over 2 years ago, I found two of these books at Goodwill, ripped through the first one, bought the missing middle volume, and then promptly never finished the series. I picked up the first volume, which contains 4 books, and zipped through it yesterday, then started the second volume. I finished that tonight and I've started the third, so I will finally finish this series!
Chloe by Design is a series of 12 books, but they're most easily bought in the 3 bind-up editions, which contain 4 books each.
The cover to the left here is the second bind-up, containing books 5-8.
As I did the first time, I'm going to show the covers for the individual books, though this time I'm not going to try to match them up to how the bind-up is broken up.
So when we first met Chloe from Santa Cruz, CA, she was a contestant on a teen version of Design Diva (Project Runway). The first four books got her through the three auditions to New York City and then through the entire competition. I thought the competition part went a little quickly. Can't remember if I mentioned that in my first review or not, but it definitely felt that way this second read through.
So now Chloe finds herself interning for a designer in New York City, which was her prize for winning the competition. She's living in a dorm at FIT, alongside other interns. Two are definitely in college. I can't remember how old the mean girl one is. But yeah, one is a mean girl who never gets to like Chloe because she feels she didn't earn her way to the internship. Reality TV may be silly, but some of the competition shows are no doubt competitions. Chloe definitely earned her prize.
Most of the book is about Chloe's adventures in interning.
She's in a different department for each 2 weeks of her 2-month internship. She starts out with Laura in knits and denims. Laura wasn't my favorite. She's clearly unorganized and I just didn't really like her. Chloe's one big mistake during her internship is something I still can't understand. She was doing her second internship at the time, with Taylor in dresses, but also doing 2 days a week still with Laura, who's basically such a mess that she needs an intern more than Taylor. Chloe is tasked with doing something with designing jackets, which are supposed to pair with the dresses she worked on with Taylor. So she uses designs she did for Taylor and Laura gets upset and says she cut corners. Yes, she used the work she did for Taylor...but aren't the jackets supposed to go with those dresses? I read this part over a few times and still have no idea what she did wrong. So that's why I don't like Laura much. Taylor is uptight and can be cold, but I liked her better.
Chloe's third two weeks are with Michael in PR and then the same two days with Laura still. This had some way more interesting tasks and I liked it the best of the internship divisions.
The majority of the book really is serious details about interning, which is pretty cool, because it has Chloe mostly choosing her internship over Jake, her friend-possibly-boyfriend from the first books. She also never stoops to any sort of bad level with Madison the mean girl, who digs her own grave during Fashion Week.
Chloe is a likeable yet sometimes frustrating character. There's a scene where she's more interested in texts from Jake than listening to Michael and I wanted to smack her, especially because most of the department heads just give instructions and then leave the interns to it. She could have easily gotten her assignment then checked her phone when she was alone. Stupid.
Chloe's BFF, Alex, from California visits during Fashion Week and ends up helping Chloe with the show, as the designer is happy for another volunteer. Not sure how realistic that is because Alex has zero experience, but I like her so whatever. In the two months Chloe has been gone, Alex suddenly cares about fashion and now has a boyfriend, both of which Chloe is happy about.
Everything goes smoothly. Chloe is asked back for next summer and she's adjusted well to New York. She's made friends with the older interns and the mean one got herself in trouble so she won't be interning again. Chloe stays friends with Jake, even through some ups and downs, and they decide she's just plain too busy to balance him along with everything else. Very mature decision. I didn't find this one as fun or interesting as the competition one, but that's because it was more loaded with fashion details and less with fun places and challenges. It was still fun though.
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