Book for tweens helps with sibling and blended family drama

Mom Made Us Write This In The Summer (Max and Maggie Journal) by Ali Maier

Twin siblings Maggie and Max are assigned by their mother to create a handwritten journal over the course of a summer. She lays out some ground rules, and then they are to take turns going first and then responding to one another’s entries. The result is the kind of messy, handwritten, doodled in journal that has been building creativity since paper stopped being as precious as diamonds. There are margin notes (oh how I love margin notes) and sticky notes and tape and different pens depicted in the pages. In short, it’s everything a written artifact should be, and an exact facsimile of the kind of ephemera a blog can never reproduce. In short, I happily accepted a review copy so that I could provide you my honest reaction, because I love books as much as I love ephemera, and I knew this would be fun.

I wanted very much to love this book, because I completely adore the concept, but I didn’t. It’s possible that the reason I do not love it is that it is doing a very good job of what it’s supposed to do- appealing to 10 year olds by talking about things of interest to 10 year olds, and about sibling drama from the point of view of a 10 year old. Having left age 10 in the metaphorical dust, and also having moved well beyond the stage where I squabble with my only sibling (because I’m very lucky to have not only an amazing sibling, but also seem to have hit the jackpot in the sibling-in-law sweepstakes, my family life has reached a lack of drama most 10 year olds can’t even imagine) I had trouble relating to this book.

What I do like about it is that there is one male and one female protagonist. I also like very much that the author didn’t confine each to their respective gender stereotypes. (Max is the one who is good at school, for instance, and Maggie does not like babies.) I think the penmanship is probably a bit nicer than the average 10 year old produces, but I think the target audience would find the fact that the journal is produced to look like it was handwritten would appeal to 10 year olds. (I couldn’t get past the hearts over every “i,” myself, but I well remember doing that myself at around this age… I guess it’s something we grow out of liking…)

I’m also pleased (absurdly so, considering that I didn’t actually enjoy the book myself) by the fact that events reported by both children have little overlap. I’ve often said that only in the movies or in books do 10 people do something together and all have the same experience- the reality is that if you ask two siblings about something that happened, they have very different perspectives. (To wit: My father used to take us with him to the hardware store on the weekends. I thought this was the BEST THING EVER. I wax nostalgic about bins of nails. I love going to the hardware store, alone or with my kids, because I have positive associations. My brother swears that he dreaded these outings, they were the single most boring thing ever to have happened to him, and that he hated every minute of it. If we had journaled our experiences at the time, I imagine we’d have learned a lot about perspective, and possibly about each other.)

I also really like that the book has not one but two companion books available- one to encourage your child to create their own shared journal, and one to encourage the whole family to share and learn about each other. I feel weird saying, “I didn’t care for this, but I’m going to recommend it,” but that’s exactly where I came down on this book. I think kids in the 8-12 age range will enjoy reading it- particularly if they struggle with understanding a close age sibling. I also think the companion journal could be a great activity for “pen pals,” or for bridging the gap among members of a newly blended family. It can be hard for kids to understand that someone who has so many of the same experiences they do can see them so very differently, and I think this book could be just the tool to help them figure that out.