School Library Journal Review
Gr 5-8-This sequel to Me and Miranda Mullaly finds Chollie, Duke, and Sam finishing up the school year while navigating relationships with their first girlfriends. There are movies, trips to the mall, and nerve-racking dinners with families. At school, when the eighth grade class is denied a field trip to New York City, the students choose to host an NYC Nites showcase evening instead of a dance, which requires a lot of work. Against this backdrop of activity, we see the relationships grow, change, and sometimes end in entertainingly predictable middle school ways. Written in the boys' first-person accounts as well as replies to language arts class writing prompts, this novel explores the heady and perplexing emotions of first "like." The multiple narratives are sometimes confusing, but all of the voices are distinctive and true to life. It is refreshing to see a book that examines the lives and emotions of middle schoolers during their first attempts at romantic relationships. Though the characters are middle-class and mostly white, readers will be able to relate to them and project a variety of qualities onto them. VERDICT This upbeat series will be popular with those who enjoy humorous realistic titles such as Betsy Byars's 1988 The Burning Questions of Bingo Brown and Varian Johnson's more recent The Great Greene Heist.-Karen Yingling, Blendon Middle School, Westerville, OH © Copyright 2017. Library Journals LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution permitted.
Publisher's Weekly Review
The gang from Me and Miranda Mullaly returns for more hijinks and heartbreak as eighth grade comes to an end. The story's dizzying structure rotates narration among the three male leads-insufferably arrogant Duke, jock Chollie, and class clown Sam-intermingled with English class prompts written by the boys and two of their girlfriends, Miranda and Erica. (Only Duke's girlfriend, Sharon, gets shut out of telling her side, but she's a seventh grader, and there is a definite hierarchy at Penn Valley Middle School.) Relationships wobble, the canceled class trip is replaced with an ambitious talent show meant to replicate a night in New York City, and graduation looms, bringing anxiety about the prospect of what awaits in high school. The multiple perspectives offer amusing insights into how the boys and girls view the same episode through completely different lenses, but they aren't enough to offset the thin characterizations. Readers in search of light humor about middle school romance will find what they're looking for. Ages 10-up. Agent: Daniel Lazar, Writers House. (May) © Copyright PWxyz, LLC. All rights reserved.