The Lottie Project is a 1997 children's novel by Jacqueline Wilson.
It focuses on Charlie Enright, whose strict new teacher has set the class a project about the Victorians. Charlie decides to write hers as the diary of Lottie, a Victorian girl her own age, who is forced to work as a nursery maid and care for a rich family's children. As Charlie experiences changes in her school life and friendships, and her mother grows close to a new employer, she expresses her conflicted feelings through Lottie's story.
Tropes:
- Alcoholic Parent: Lottie's father was an alcoholic who spent all the family's money on booze.
- Animal Motifs: Robin is associated with actual robins.
- Apathetic Student: Charlie is intelligent but dislikes school and doesn't pay attention. She compensates for this by imagining Lottie as an excellent student who could have become a teacher if she hadn't had to work as as a servant.
- Author Appeal: Like Wilson, Charlie is fascinated with the Victorian era and her favourite colour is red.
- Baby Be Mine: Freddie is abducted by an unhinged woman who wants to raise him as her own child.
- Big Fancy House: Jamie lives in a huge Victorian house, and Charlie counts fourteen rooms including a library.
- Blonde, Brunette, Redhead: Charlie is a redhead, Angela a brunette, and Lisa blonde.
- Brainless Beauty: "Lisa has got a very pretty head but it contains no brain whatsoever."
- Calling Parents by Their Name: Charlie calls Jo by her given name because she's such a young mum.
- Conspicuous Consumption: Lottie notes that the family she works for buys a lot of things solely to show off their wealth. For example, Louisa has an expensive china doll with many outfits and three pairs of shoes, whereas Lottie's family can't afford real shoes for their children.
- Disappeared Dad: Charlie's father has never been involved in her life. Lottie's father has recently died, forcing her out to work to support her family.
- Does Not Like Men: Charlie takes this stance and even has a girls' club about how girls are better than boys. She also wanted to extend the rules to men but her best friends argued this. However, she does soften later in the book, making friends with Jamie Edwards and tolerating Mark because she wants his son Robin to like her.
- Domestic Abuse: Lottie's late father beat his wife.
- Don't Split Us Up: After Lottie's father died, her grandparents offered to adopt one of her sisters; but her mother refused because the children did not want to be separated.
- "Eureka!" Moment: Charlie gets the idea for her project when she sees a photo of a young Victorian nursery maid who she thinks looks a bit like herself.
- Fangirl: Angela regularly obsesses over various pop stars and boy bands, and falls in love with them all.
- Fiery Redhead: Charlie and Lottie are both bold, temperamental girls with red hair.
- Fire-Forged Friends: Eliza and Mrs Angel are initially hostile to Lottie, but become friends with her after she covers for a visit from Eliza's boyfriend (which would have caused Eliza to be fired, since the servants aren't allowed "gentleman callers.")
- Gender-Blender Name: Charlotte "Charlie" Enright.
- Good Parents:
- Jo is a generally kind, responsible, and understanding mother.
- Lottie has a saintly mother who is unfailingly kind, a wonderful cook, and toils all hours of the day to support her family after her husband dies.
- Angela, Lisa, and Jamie are all shown to have loving parents at home.
- Hormone-Addled Teenager: Although not quite teenagers yet, Angela and Lisa are both obsessed with boys, much to Charlie's irritation.
- Infant Immortality:
- Baby Freddie survives a serious illness despite there being little in the way of medical care available for him.
- Robin also survives pneumonia, although as both Miss Beckworth and Jamie point out, it's now a much less deadly illness thanks to modern medicine.
- If You Thought That Was Bad...: Upon seeing the photo of a Victorian servant her own age, Charlie reflects that her own life isn't that bad and things would have been much worse if she were a Victorian. Subsequently, Lottie's story makes her feel better, since Lottie's problems are always more severe than Charlie's.
- Inter Class Friendship: Charlie has a poor mother who works three jobs, while Jamie is from a wealthy upper-middle class family who live in a valuable Victorian house.
- Intergenerational Friendship: Eliza (a young adult) and Mrs Angel (middle-aged) are good friends, and eventually 11-year-old Lottie also becomes friendly with them.
- Marry the Nanny: Jo becomes romantically involved with Mark, whose son she is hired to care for.
- Masculine Girl, Feminine Boy: Charlie is a tough, tomboyish girl while Robin and Jamie are both quiet, gentle boys.
- Meaningful Name:
- Charlie's full name is Charlotte Alice Katherine Enright, spelling out CAKE. Over the course of the story she develops an interest in baking, and becomes quite skilled in making cakes.
- Lottie is mentioned to have been named after the doll her mother played with as a child.
- Mirror Character: The events in Charlie's and Lottie's lives mirror each other.
- Most Writers Are Writers: Although Charlie doesn't aspire to be a writer, the plot focuses on a story she is writing as part of a school project.
- Multigenerational Household: Angela lives in one, and her grandmother and aunt live with her.
- Mum Looks Like a Sister: Jo is young enough that people often think she is Charlie's older sister.
- My God, What Have I Done?:
- Charlie goes through this when Robin runs away after she accidentally convinces him Mark doesn't want him.
- Lottie also has this reaction when she thinks Freddie was kidnapped while she had left the children unattended.
- One-Steve Limit: Averted with Charlie and Lottie, who are both named Charlotte but go by different nicknames.
- Outliving One's Offspring:
- Lottie's mother is still alive, but three of her children have died, since child mortality rates were high in Victorian times.
- Freddie was kidnapped by a woman who had lost her own baby.
- Parent with New Paramour:
- Charlie hates the idea of Jo dating Mark and is worried that they will get married. By the end of the book she has come to accept him, although by this time he and Jo have cooled their romance (at least for now) because their respective children are still so young.
- Lottie is upset when she discovers that a local innkeeper may be courting her mother.
- Pet the Dog:
- When Charlie breaks down in tears at school over Robin, Miss Beckworth is gentle and understanding with her and reassures her that he'll recover.
- After Freddie recovers from serious illness, the Master takes his family to the seaside and brings Lottie, Eliza, and Mrs Angel because they worked so hard to nurse Freddie.
- Picky Eater: All three of the children Lottie cares for are spoilt and picky about food. Freddie will only eat bread if it is mashed up with milk; Louisa won't eat crusts or drink milk; and Victor fusses over lumps in his custard.
- Practically Different Generations:
- Lottie is eleven years older than her baby sister Ada May.
- Angela is from a big family and has baby/toddler-aged siblings.
- Recycled Plot: Lottie is in the same situation as Coral from This Girl. Both have to lie about their age to get a job taking care of children, one of whom is named Freddie; and are exploited by the children's demanding mother. Lottie is an actual Victorian nursery maid while Coral pretends she is one.
- Self-Insert Fic: Charlie writes her school history project as the fictional diary of a Victorian servant named Lottie, who is a thinly veiled copy of Charlie herself.
- Ship Tease: Charlie has plenty of this with Jamie, and he even kisses her at one point, thinking she was hinting at wanting him to kiss her (although she makes it very clear she wasn't.)
- Stern Teacher: Miss Beckworth is ultimately one of these, despite Charlie initially perceiving her as a Sadist Teacher.
- Struggling Single Mother: Jo holds down several jobs and struggles to support her and Charlie.
- Teenage Pregnancy: Jo was a young teenager when Charlie was born.
- Token Black Friend: Charlie's friend Angela is Black and is the only character of colour in the novel.
- Tunnel of Love: Jo and Mark ride on one together, and Charlie and Robin witness them kissing.
- Uptown Girl: Mark is middle class and has a well paid job and nice house, while Jo is on a low income and works three jobs to support her child. Subverted in that Jo is actually from a wealthy family, but they refuse to support her financially because they disapprove of her life choices.
- Wicked Stepfather: Robin lives with Mark because his mother's new husband does not want him around.
- Write Who You Know: All the characters in Lottie's story are based on the people in Charlie's life.
