Dear Sweet Pea

Dear Sweet Pea
Julie Murphy
Harper Collins, 2019 282 pages
Grades 4-7
Realistic Fiction

Sweet Pea is preparing to graduate seventh grade and begin eighth in her Texas combined high school. Life has been extra confusing ever since her parents have divorced and now Dad lives in an identical house two doors down. Sweet Pea's best friends are loyal Oscar and Cheese the cat, ever since she fell out with her former BFF, the class Queen Bee. To make matters worse, she feels conspicuous and vulnerable because of her unconventional body type and very public family situation. When an elderly neighbor and the town's advice columnist asks for her help when leaving town, Sweet Pea takes the job seriously. The neighbor's home becomes a solace and she takes a crack at answering some of the letters. One such letter comes from her former BFF and Sweet Pea begins to see life from someone else's perspective and understand and sympathize with her nemesis. The old friendship is restored, yet Oscar feels slighted. How can Sweet Pea balance two separate homes and two separate friends, all while keeping her secret writing a secret?

Julie Murphy is an established writer for young adults, who is now bringing the world of body positivity to middle grade. Kids will applaud Sweet Pea's character and feistiness, while coping with weighing more than her peers and processing her parent's very public divorce. The reason behind the divorce-Dad's discovering that he is gay-has rocked the small Texas town and Murphy tackles the issue of small-town homophobia. Sweet Pea's teacher is comfortably gay and in a committed relationship without drama and Oscar is working out his sexuality, all while being a teenage wrestler, displaying that this is part of life and does not have to be a scandal. Murphy nails the different characters and shows that people have layers and are not always what they seem. My favorite character is the elderly neighbor, who is understanding with a cool taste in music, though outwardly gruff and eccentric. It is a bit unrealistic that Sweet Pea successfully fills in for the neighbor writing the column, as well as the situation’s remedy, yet readers will enjoy putting themselves in the same situation and may even try their hand at writing on their own. Filled with gentle humor, kids will fall into Sweet Pea's world and appreciate this quiet story, which is more about dealing with friends and family issues than the advice column hook. A comforting story for kids struggling to navigate the world in which they are thrust and feel as if they have little control.