Just Pretend

March 29, 2021
Led by an endearing and resilient heroine, Sharp’s memoir makes a strong case for imagination as a middle school survival tactic. A freckled white seventh grader living in suburban Allentown, N.J., Tori doesn’t have control over much in her life: her divorced parents, who are loving but distracted, argue about child support; her angry older brother bullies her; and she’s not allowed to stay home by herself, even while her mom takes her sister to dance class. Luckily, Tori is relentlessly creative, leading art projects, creative writing endeavors, and role-playing games among her willing group of friends. At the top of the friend list is bestie Taylor, who has struggles of her own, including a strict stepmother who is uncomfortable with the girls’ writing about goddesses. Sharp intersperses the autobiography with scenes from the fantasy novel Tori is writing, about an outcast fairy who befriends a lonely brown-skinned runaway named Penny. The memoir suffers from an uneven plot—late in the story, Tori confronts her father about not calling for months, though this is the first time readers hear of it. But backed by lithe illustrations peppered with late-’90s details, Sharp creates a portrait of a resourceful young artist using her passion to forge connections. Ages 8–12. Agent: Brent Taylor, Triada US.

April 15, 2021
Crafting fantasy worlds offers a budding middle school author relief and distraction from the real one in this graphic memoir debut. Everyone in Tori's life shows realistic mixes of vulnerability and self-knowledge while, equally realistically, seeming to be making it up as they go. At least, as she shuttles between angrily divorced parents--dad becoming steadily harder to reach, overstressed mom spectacularly incapable of reading her offspring--or drifts through one wearingly dull class after another, she has both vivacious bestie Taylor Lee and, promisingly, new classmate Nick as well as the (all-girl) heroic fantasy, complete with portals, crystal amulets, and evil enchantments, taking shape in her mind and on paper. The flow of school projects, sleepovers, heart-to-heart conversations with Taylor, and like incidents (including a scene involving Tori's older brother, who is having a rough adolescence, that could be seen as domestic violence) turns to a tide of change as eighth grade winds down and brings unwelcome revelations about friends. At least the story remains as solace and, at the close, a sense that there are still chapters to come in both worlds. Working in a simple, expressive cartoon style reminiscent of Raina Telgemeier's, Sharp captures facial and body language with easy naturalism. Most people in the spacious, tidily arranged panels are White; Taylor appears East Asian, and there is diversity in background characters. A rich and deeply felt slice of life. (afterword, design notes) (Graphic memoir. 10-13)

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