Lanie Holland American Girl Doll of the Year

Lanie is a ten-year-old girl living in Cambridge, Massachusetts. She enjoys science and nature, and considers herself a scientist. Lanie thinks she was born with "outside genes" while the rest of her family was born with "inside genes". She dreams of becoming an expert scientist and explore deep jungles in Asia, tracking wildlife, or trying experiments. She keeps her own nature journal with "factoids" and notes. At the start of the story, Lanie's best friend Dakota, who is a fellow nature lover like Lanie, is halfway across the world rescuing orangutans in the deep jungle of Indonesia, while Lanie must stay at home. The two girls communicate with each other through email. Lanie's family includes her father, who loves paddle-ball and loves to cook new recipes, Lanie's mother, who is the sister of Lanie's Aunt Hannah, Lanie's sister Angela, who is 16 years old and plays the cello, and finally little Emily, Lanie's 7-year-old sister who Lanie finds quite annoying. But when Aunt Hannah comes to stay, Lanie learns to wonder of nature and creativity in her own backyard.