Taylor and I were sitting on my front porch pretending to be millionaires as the afternoon sun turned into evening. It was only the second week of summer vacation and already boredom was like a pesky mosquito that we were swatting away.
“Only boring people get bored,” my mom had already said like a hundred times. “Life’s what you make it.”

Now that’s a good beginning for a middle grade summer read. I’m seeing comparisons to Beverly Cleary and Judy Blume, and although the latter is probably a good readalike author, The Battle of Darcy Lane is definitely pitched to the twelve and up crowd who have probably outgrown Ramona Quimby. Our narrator, Julia, is not sure what she’s “outgrown” (dolls? unicorns?) and what pseudo-sophisticated games and paraphernalia she thinks are just nonsense, courtesy of the new girl across the street, Alyssa (lipstick? women’s magazines?).

The summer devolves into a series of games and contests. Whose best friend is Taylor, Julia’s or Alyssa’s? Who’s the best player of the complicated ball game, Russia? And does it really matter? Does Peter, Julia’s crush/neighbor/fellow band geek, like Julia or Alyssa best? Why is Taylor acting so weird? Why is Alyssa so mean? Will the cicadas, the ones that only come out every seventeen years, ever really emerge?

My twelve year old, Z-baby, might really like this book if I could get her to read it. It’s a realistic but sweet look at girls becoming teens and trying to fit in and be individuals and stand up to peer pressure and understand friendship—all over the course of one boring, eventful summer. Yes, it’s a series of contradictions and ups and downs. Isn’t adolescence rather like that?

(And yes, I am reminded of Judy Blume, but I like Ms. Altebrando’s “budding adolescence” novel better than I ever liked Are You There God, It’s Me, Margaret.)