MEG CABOT HAS BEEN REINCARNATED! *Mastercard!*

Yes, into the form of young adult author Michele Jaffe. The two authors are actually pretty good friends, too, which explains why their writing styles are so similar. Which, in turn, explains why I loved Jaffe's book, Bad Kitty.
The whole cat+mystery thing totally suggests Pink Panther, but it's so NOT. Meet Jas, short for Jasmine, who straight-off-the-bat admits she has no superpower. Except maybe that cats like her, which explains how she got into the mess that she's in.
Because while Jas and her family were on vacation, her cat superpower just decided to send out a signal or a beacon or something, so while Jas was sitting by the pool in a cute bikini, an angry cat pounced onto her chest. Next thing she knew, this Terminator-esque dude with a gun wearing nothing but a Speedo comes up and asks for the cat back. This is followed by a little kid who tells Jas to RUN, OTHERWISE THE CAT'S IN TROUBLE! Jas runs away from that pool area into the next one (because, you know, resorts in Vegas have a few pools, usually) where a wedding happens to be taking place. Jas finds herself knocking the five-tiered wedding cake and the bride into the pool. And the groom didn't even jump in and try to play off the situation!
Okay, right here in the book was where I started to crack up. I mean, come on, that situation is ridiculously funny. Especially when you read about it in the book.
Next Jas is taken to a holding cell in resort security, where she finds out she's off the hook; because the parent of that boy whose cat she rescued? She's a famous model and she wants to thank Jas for saving the cat.
Another aspect of this book is that Jas is doing a project for her English class, where she keeps a journal of all the "little life lessons" she learns over the summer. So this is what she got out of this situation...

"Little Life Lesson 2: A good way to ensure you will never have a boyfriend is to have a large armed man with an uncertain grasp of English heckle you in public.
Little Life Lesson 3: If for some reason the guy might still be interested, following up by having your father rush over right afterward screaming, 'Jasmine, you know you are not allowed to talk to strangers!' as though you were six will nip it in the bud. Oh, and it helps if your father is wearing a safari suit. With shorts. And knee socks. Because this is his idea of what you wear in the desert."
(pg. 15)

See that? I was laughing by page 15, and I don't laugh easily, usually. (Although I did cry reading the last Harry Potter book...) And you can also see how similar this author is to Meg Cabot. They have the same quirks, and same superpower of being able to write from the point of view of a bubbly, sarcastic, quirky teenager.
So yeah, back to the summary.
After she gets out of jail, Jas' father tells her no more getting involved in other people's business. So, of course, like any other normal teen, she goes out clubbing with her bratty cousin and her bratty cousin's airheaded friend. This starts a whirlwind of a mystery that Jas can't help but get involved in, no matter what her father, The Thwarter, says. In fact, Jas gets her friends on her side; they drive down to help her. So Jas, her prissy best friend Polly, her random, zany friend Roxy, and Roxy's cute, totally-meant-for-Polly brother Tom, and her bratty cousin+bratty cousin's friend all go out to solve the big mystery: who is threatening the model, why didn't she make a fuss about the Bad Kitty incident?
And halfway through the book we come to this point:

"Four things were immediately clear to me:
1. I was going to die of embarrassment.
2. After I did that, I was going to have to find Polly and kill her for making my dress so short.
3. Twice.
4. I was never buying Muppet underwear again."
(pg. 161)

Yeah, now you gotta read, because you have to see what situation Jas could have possibly gotten herself into involving a short dress and Muppet underwear. YOU'D BE SURPRISED.
The other cool part is how in the footnotes of this story (yes, another great book with footnotes, I love it!) Jas, Polly, Roxy, Tom, and occasionally said bratty cousin's best friend all converse about the book. You wouldn't believe how lifelike the characters get, the argue just like Cara and I argue, or Melissa and Holly and me or something.
This book is SO Mastercard for Cabot friends. (Mastercard=priceless.) I must read more by Michele Jaffe, I hear she has adult mystery novels too... ♠♠♠♠♠