It's
Marvelous Middle Grade Monday
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and #IMWAYR day
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June 3, 2025 by Scholastic Press
E ARC provided by Edelweiss Plus
Esme is glad that the school year is over, even though she has to suffer through an awards assembly at the end of the year. Her older sisters Bea, Claire, and Delaney all excel in various fields, but Esme is not particularly great at any one thing, so never brings home any awards to make her mother happy. Her father left the family three years ago, and now lives in Shanghai, so her mother struggles a bit to take the girls to all of their activities and pay the bills. Esme loves spending her summer at the Deep Woods pool, and starts the season off by visiting with Tegen. The pool tradition has all of the kids lining up and jumping in at the same time, and the legend is that whoever hits the water first will get a wish. Esme is trying to think of the best wording, but a new girl, Kaya, gets in her way and hits the water first after being pushed. Esme notices her struggling, and alerts the life guard, which is a little embarassing, especially since Esme's friends from the swim team, Cat and Marissa, comment that maybe Kaya can't swim. Esme has grown a lot over the year, and has gotten much faster. She does well in the time trials, and even excels at the difficult butterfly stroke. She hopes to do well and make her mother proud, but struggles with her friend Tegen's approach to the swim season. Tegen doesn't want to be intense or goofy about anything, and prefers to talk about boys and clothes. Esme even goes to the mall with her to try on bikinis, and doesn't understand why Tegen and Marissa are so hard on themselves about their bodies. Esme enjoys hanging out at the pool all morning long and competing at meets. Her friends' mothers all come and help out with snacks and timing events, but her own mother is always too busy working or driving her sisters to events. When Esme wins an event, her sisters tell her not to let her mother know, because she will ruin swimming for Esme. After Tegen's moms tell Ms. Sun how well Esme did, she shows up at a meet, and Esme finds out how much pressure her sisters must be under. Not only does her mother insist that Esme do well, she also thinks she should consider all of her teammates her adversaries. Esme would rather have fun, and struggles to figure out how she can be true to herself but also make her mother happy. She helps Kaya practice flip turns, even though this means that Kaya comes close to beating her, and is appalled when her mother refers to Kaya as "that Black girl". Her mother also isn't happy that Esme is getting tan because it makes her look like she "works in a field", and Esme has to process the fact that her mother has racist tendencies. When Tegen quits the team because she no longer finds swimming fun, Esme realizes that she has to decide for herself how she will live her life, even if it is in a way that doesn't mesh with her mother's.
This really is the perfect summer read. Most of the book is fun and upbeat, with snacks and games at the pool, and an overwhelming feeling of belonging to a place that just feels right. I loved the inclusion of Joe, the "world's oldest life guard" who has been coming to Deep Woods since he was Esme's age in the 1960s. He offers Esme a perfect description of what the pool means to him, and I'm not at all surprised that Ms. Shang spent time on the swim team during her teen years. My house backs up to the local community pool, so my children spent a LOT of time there. It's definitely a cool experience to have, and I love that there is a book to share that experience with others.
For swimmers, there are plenty of details about practice, meets, and techniques, as well as some excellent discussion of how to mentally prepare for races and how to deal with competition with your friends. When I coached cross country, this was a frequent conversation, and I loved seeing how Esme learned to balance having fun with wanting to be competitive. The fact that she is also dealing with Tegen's more mature ways and deciding that they aren't for her quite yet perfectly encapsulated the middle grade experience.
While many middle grade books deal with grieving parents who have passed away, it is so much more realistic and productive to portray difficult parents whose values are problematic. Esme's mom isn't mean or abusive, but she isn't supportive, either. Esme loves her, but wants her approval, even though her mother has an outlook on life that Esme doesn't wish to embrace. I always wondered about my runners whose parents never came to meets, and worried when I couldn't be at my older daughter's races because I was coaching her younger sister. Esme's older sisters are supportive, and help her work through some of her issues with her mother in productive ways. Seeing different family dynamics is fascinating, and so much more interesting than yet another book about grief.
I'm always glad to see more books about sports, and swimming is certainly something that will interest a lot of young readers. Add this to Ahn's 2024 Swimming Into Trouble (Julia on the Go #1), Agarwal and Durfey-Lavoie's Sink or Swim, Sumner's Deep Water, Morrison's Up for Air, Fipps' Starfish, and the book that made me the most jealous about how someone else spent their summer, Holm's Sunny Makes a Splash, for a perfect tsunami of swimtastic titles.
Ooh, this looks good. I've read a few of your other swimming recommendations. I will have to check this one out!
ReplyDeleteThis does look good--and I agree about the perhaps excessive number of books out right now dealing with the death of a parent. This sounds more interesting in many ways, and, while kids who are grieving need to know they aren't alone, reading about other peoples' grief can get hard to take after a while, when you have your own to cope with.
ReplyDeleteThis sounds really good. The sports part doesn't interest me too much, but the family dynamics sure sound interesting. Thanks for the post.
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