Dork Diaries: Tales from a Not-So-Fabulous Life by Rachel Renee Russell

From the Publisher

New school. New mean girl. New crush.

New diary so Nikki can spill about all of it...

Children's Literature

Have you ever felt like a dork? In Dork Diaries, Rachel Russell has created a humorous account of the middle school years. If you have ever been left out of a clique, not invited to the party of the season, or wondered where to sit in the school cafeteria, you will understand how Nikki Maxwell feels when she starts classes at a new school. She does not know a single person and her outfit is not cool enough to fit with the popular girls. What can a dork do to win friends and influence people? While Nikki does not make it to the top clique at Westchester Day School, her account of surviving the perils of middle school is hilarious. She makes friends, creates a sensation with her amazing tattoos, and connects with a cool boy named Brandon. And even though she is not the most popular girl in school, Nikki remains true to herself and to her ideals. Young readers struggling through the middle school jungle will love Nikki Maxwell immediately. After all, what reader can resist a charming, inquisitive, self-proclaimed dork? Reviewer: Suzanna E. Henshon, Ph.D.

School Library Journal

Gr 5-8–Fourteen-year-old Nikki J. Maxwell has been awarded a scholarship to a prestigious private middle school as a part of her father’s bug extermination contract. Her angst as she deals with the resident mean girl, her embarrassing parents, her crush on the hot boy, and making new friends are all recorded alongside numerous sketches of her life. Although occasionally amusing, Nikki is not a very likable character. She is shallow and self-centered and fails to show any growth in the book, even as she one-ups popular and cruel MacKenzie in the end. In fact, Nikki, who steals her neighbor’s hearing aid and plays pranks on her little sister, is somewhat of a mean girl herself. All the other characters are underdeveloped, including Nikki’s family and her new BFFs, Chloe and Zoey. Black-and-white drawings, which are often witty, appear throughout the text, which is printed on lined pages as though from a diary. Fans of Jeff Kinney’s Diary of a Wimpy Kid (Abrams) may enjoy this book, but it’s an additional purchase.–Terry Ann Lawler, Phoenix Public Library, AZ

Kirkus Reviews

When her father barters enrollment in a prestigious private school in exchange for his bug-extermination services, Nikki suddenly finds her life in turmoil. At Westchester Country Day, Nikki encounters uber-snobbish MacKenzie, the archetypal mean girl and her pack of "CCP"-Nikki's acronym for the cute, cool and popular-friends. Nikki chronicles all of her new-girl angst and trepidations as well as her fledgling crush in her diary. Russell's narrative deftly captures the winsome vulnerability of a girl perched on the cusp of teenhood. The comical sketches, executed a la Diary of a Wimpy Kid, add an element of self-deprecating humor to the tale. An abundance of up-to-the-minute pop-cultural references threatens to date this novel quickly. Nikki's ultimate realization that she needs to be true to herself comes across as genuine rather than contrived, however, so despite its modern trappings, Nikki's journey of self-discovery will appeal to preadolescent readers struggling to find their places in the world. (Fiction. 9-13)

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