October 29, 2018
Peeking at her father’s emails, 12-year-old Californian Bett learns two pieces of upsetting information: her father has fallen in love with a man she’s never met, and the two of them are scheming to send Bett and the man’s 12-year-old daughter, Avery, away to summer camp together. Furious, Bett finds Avery’s email address to break the horrible news. The girls vow not to speak to each other during the summer, but despite their differences (Bett is spontaneous and adventurous; Avery is bookish and fearful), they form a strong bond. When their fathers part ways during a disastrous trip to China, the girls, who had been looking forward to being sisters, are determined to find a way to reunite them. Written entirely in emails and letters, this laugh-out-loud novel showcases the collaborative skills of bestselling authors Sloan (Short) and Wolitzer (Bellzhar). In addition to the two distraught protagonists, the authors create several other unforgettable characters, including Avery’s estranged biological mother and Bett’s feisty grandmother. Featuring a dramatic climax and a host of surprising twists, the novel affirms that families conventional and unconventional are families just the same. Ages 10–up.
December 15, 2018
The Parent Trap gets a modern makeover in this entertaining and endearing middle-grade novel about two 12-year-old girls, one camp, and a summer that will bond them for a lifetime. Avery, an aspiring writer from New York, and Bett, a California surfer girl, are the lights of their respective single father's lives--and each is very much used to it. So the news that their gay dads fell in love at a conference and have been secretly dating for three months does not sit well with either of them. Worse still, the girls are bundled off to a nerd camp where they are expected to bond like family while their dads head off on an eight-week motorcycle adventure in China. Sloan and Wolizter make strategic use of their tale's epistolary (or rather email) format to create two disparate yet familiar-feeling three-dimensional characters who are from very different worlds. That they will eventually become sisters feels inevitable, but that does not diminish the enjoyment of watching Avery and Bett bond over animals at camp, gradually growing toward each other and then with each other. Their increasing closeness is tracked in the evolution of their correspondence, which becomes littered with nicknames and discussions of everything from periods and pet phobias to boys. Bett is African-American and was carried by a Brazilian surrogate, and Avery has both white and Jewish heritages.A sweet and amusing tale that celebrates diversity while reinforcing the power of love and the importance of family. (Fiction. 10-13)
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February 15, 2019
Grades 5-8 Two popular writers team up for a Where'd You Go, Bernadette-esque tale for the middle-school set. An entire country lies between anxious New Yorker Avery Bloom and adventurous Bett Devlin, but there's something powerful connecting them: their dads are in love. At first horrified at the prospect of becoming?gulp?sisters, the two surprise themselves by bonding at a summer sleepaway camp while their dads motorcycle their way across China. But when their dads' relationship sours, they're willing to do whatever it takes to get them back together. Even if the target readership eschews email these days, they'll be hard-pressed not to be laughing out loud at the witty, clever email and letter repartee among the girls, their dads, and the rest of the supporting cast. Though the story lacks the emotional depth of more true-to-life novels dealing with blended families, such as Olugbemisola Rhuday-Perkovich and Audrey Vernick's Naomis Too (2018), its escalating stakes and Parent Trap-like setup is sure to appeal to both authors' fan bases. Alternately heartwarming and hilarious.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)
March 1, 2019
At the start of this epistolary (via email) novel, twelve-year-olds Bett Devlin, an adventure-loving California girl of African American and Brazilian descent, and Avery Bloom, a tightly wound New Yorker whose single father is Ukrainian Jewish, are strangers (and adversaries) about to be thrown together at sleep-away summer camp. Their fathers are semi-secretly, bi-coastally dating, and they want their daughters to get to know each other while they themselves are vacationing in China. The girls are resistant, especially set-in-her-ways Avery, but they gradually become non-enemies and then friends and then actually psyched to become sisters, keeping up their correspondence even after camp ends (spoiler alert: they get kicked out). But while Bett and Avery are busily planning a wedding, their dads?whose misadventures in China are humorously detailed?are breaking up. Some Parent Trap-type shenanigans ensue, but the story's main focus is the strength of chosen family. Sloan and Wolitzer nicely differentiate their protagonists' voices, making the emails believable even while the girls are seeing each other every day at camp. Occasional missives from well-drawn supporting players (the dads, Bett's personality-filled grandmother, Avery's back-in-the-picture birth mother) deepen the characterizations while further entwining the two families. Although the secondary storylines are somewhat farfetched, the warmth of the characters' interactions, including the girls' witty banter ( You and I are now the Romeo and Juliet of friendship. Only we're the Juliet and Juliet ), is emotionally satisfying. elissa Gershowitz
(Copyright 2019 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)
July 1, 2019
As this believable epistolary (via email) novel begins, twelve-year-olds Bett and Avery are strangers (and adversaries) thrown together at sleep-away summer camp by their bi-coastally dating fathers. The girls gradually become friends--even as their dads are breaking up. Parent Traptype shenanigans ensue, but the story's main focus is the strength of chosen family. The warmth of the characters' interactions, including the girls' witty banter, is emotionally satisfying.
(Copyright 2019 by The Horn Book, Incorporated, Boston. All rights reserved.)
Starred review from February 1, 2019
Gr 4-6-Sloan and Wolitzer offer a middle-grade novel about friendship and sisterhood. Written in an epistolary format, it is a thoroughly current story told through e-mail exchanges between two 12-year-old girls. Avery Bloom receives an e-mail entitled "You don't know me" from one Bett Devlin, informing her their fathers are in love, and that they have devised a plan for the tweens to meet at a summer camp. Initially reticent, the girls plot to sabotage their fathers' plans until they realize they may have more in common than they had realized. They find in each other a confidant with whom they can share the stresses of adolescence and they form a friendship sustained by humor and vulnerability. This is a convincing and heartwarming look into the experiences of female friendship and is enhanced by the charming and riveting love story between the girls' fathers. While remaining lighthearted, the narrative successfully weaves in important topics like puberty, religion, surrogacy, race, and sexual orientation, reminiscent of Judy Blume's signature style. VERDICT An imaginative and compelling middle-grade novel depicting modern friendships and modern families.-Katherine Hickey, Metropolitan Library System, Oklahoma City
Copyright 2019 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.