Back to the Drawing Board
June 28, 2019
Gr 4-7-Surviving middle school can be a nightmarish experience, especially when deciding who one's true friends are. Awkward seventh grader Danielle "Dany" Radley makes a comeback in this sequel to Making Friends. Dany is gradually fitting in, trying to be cool, and getting into shenanigans. But mean girl Cara McCoy shuts her down and makes her feel like the biggest loser in front of their mutual friend Madison. Tired of being victimized by Cara and lagging behind on homework, Dany finds a solution. Once again, her magic sketchbook turns the imaginary into reality. She creates Cloney, her fun, confident doppelganger. Life seems to go smoothly for Dany and Cloney, but unexpected things keep happening around town and with her parents, and Dany must turn things around. Gudsnuk keeps readers wildly entertained, relying on a vibrant palette of purples and pinks and big-eyed characters who survive wacky events. Tweens will relate to Dany's desire to escape reality during cringe-worthy moments. This is a fast-paced tale that deftly portrays the pitfalls of friendship and the dramatic emotional changes of middle school. VERDICT While this sequel doesn't break any new ground, it will appeal to readers with an appetite for fantastical realism.-Beronica Puhr, Oak Park Public Library, IL
Copyright 2019 School Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.
July 1, 2019
Grades 5-8 After the events of Making Friends (2018), Dany is trying to maintain her friendships while keeping a lid on how often she's using magic. But magic makes life so easy, especially when she draws a slightly more confident clone of herself in her magic notebook, and they swap places so Dany doesn't have to deal with the mortification of talking to her crush. Meanwhile, Madison is becoming better friends with mean-girl Cara, and Dany's not sure how to be friends with both of them, if she can. The frenetic pacing and freewheeling magic occasionally make the plot hard to follow, particularly when Dany's clone takes her place at school, and readers will be much better off if they're familiar with the first book. But Gudsnuk's bubbly, playful artwork, in a warm palette dominated by pink and purple and dense with detail and expressive, goggle-eyed faces, is a pleasure to look at. Fans of magical-girl stories grounded in the realities of shifting middle-school friendships might get a kick out of this series.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2019, American Library Association.)