littlebitofe's review against another edition
3.0
Good story with a clear, positive message. The illustrations are pretty good as well. A quick read - even for the age group it is meant for.
panda_incognito's review
4.0
After I finished reading the Julie series, I pictured this cover and remembered that even though the American Girl company never made a movie about Julie, they did publish a companion book about her friend. I looked for it on the library website, and was pleased to find that there were still two copies available. However, even though I was relieved that I didn't have to buy this, now that I have read it, I would definitely be interested in adding it to my collection in the future.
This book is far superior to the Julie series in writing style, story, and thematic content. It provides a detailed, personal, and non-stereotyped glimpse into the lives of Chinese immigrants in San Fransisco in the 1970s, and even though Ivy and her family were just tokens in the primary Julie series, in this book by an Asian author, they seem like real people. I enjoyed this a lot, and think that it was a lost opportunity for the Julie series to have ever been about Julie in the first place. I wish that Lisa Yee had gotten to write a whole series about Ivy, especially considering that American Girl still does not have any main historical characters who are Asian.
I enjoyed the complex characterization, and the conflicts and tensions in the story are real and believable. Even though facing a schedule conflict between a family reunion and a gymnastics meet is hardly an earth-shattering event, that is a very stressful thing for a kid to face, and was the perfect catalyst to emphasize the tensions that Ivy felt between her heritage and her life as a modern American kid. This author handled this very well, and the story is warm, meaningful, and satisfying. The historical note is also great, sharing lots of information about Chinese immigrants throughout time.
I wasn't sure what to expect from this book, but this is my favorite part of the Julie series now, and I also enjoyed Julie's appearances in it. I wish that Julie had been Ivy's sidekick instead of the other way around, especially considering how vague the divorce storyline was for Julie. If only Ivy had been the main character, Julie's parents' divorce could have been justified in its vagueness, and the series could have touched on that aspect of the seventies while focusing on Ivy's far more engaging family, life, and character instead.
This book is far superior to the Julie series in writing style, story, and thematic content. It provides a detailed, personal, and non-stereotyped glimpse into the lives of Chinese immigrants in San Fransisco in the 1970s, and even though Ivy and her family were just tokens in the primary Julie series, in this book by an Asian author, they seem like real people. I enjoyed this a lot, and think that it was a lost opportunity for the Julie series to have ever been about Julie in the first place. I wish that Lisa Yee had gotten to write a whole series about Ivy, especially considering that American Girl still does not have any main historical characters who are Asian.
I enjoyed the complex characterization, and the conflicts and tensions in the story are real and believable. Even though facing a schedule conflict between a family reunion and a gymnastics meet is hardly an earth-shattering event, that is a very stressful thing for a kid to face, and was the perfect catalyst to emphasize the tensions that Ivy felt between her heritage and her life as a modern American kid. This author handled this very well, and the story is warm, meaningful, and satisfying. The historical note is also great, sharing lots of information about Chinese immigrants throughout time.
I wasn't sure what to expect from this book, but this is my favorite part of the Julie series now, and I also enjoyed Julie's appearances in it. I wish that Julie had been Ivy's sidekick instead of the other way around, especially considering how vague the divorce storyline was for Julie. If only Ivy had been the main character, Julie's parents' divorce could have been justified in its vagueness, and the series could have touched on that aspect of the seventies while focusing on Ivy's far more engaging family, life, and character instead.
piburnjones's review
5.0
So many people have so much love for Ivy, I was really looking forward to this one.
This is the first Best Friend book I’ve read that wasn’t written by Valerie Tripp (see Elizabeth, Nellie and Emily). And, for that matter, also wasn’t written by the Julie author, Megan McDonald. For the first time since Addy, they actually found an own-voices author to write a non-white character.
For that reason, I give this book a lot of leeway. While some elements seem cliché, perhaps that’s just Adult Me having read a fair number of stories by and about first and second generation Asian Americans. Sometimes things start to look cliché because they were true for a lot of people. And since the author herself grew up Asian American in the ‘70s, I trust that this is good representation.
Compared to Nellie and Emily, I think Ivy’s book benefits from not sharing a household with the main character – Tripp goes out of her way to keep Samantha and Molly offstage, shortchanging the friendship in the service of trying to spotlight the friend. Here, it’s well established that Ivy and Julie only see each other on weekends, so instead we’re able to get a good picture of Ivy’s large and busy family. And between gymnastics, homework, family and Chinese school, Ivy has a very busy life herself – which is what creates the main conflict here: compete in a big deal gymnastics meet, or attend a big deal family reunion. In standard AG style, Ivy finds a way to do both, also solving some secondary problems along the way.
There’s nothing the strikes me as revolutionary or unusual about this book – and like much of Julie’s series, it hardly feels like historical fiction to me, though I imagine it might to my daughter. But it’s a strong, positive portrayal of an Asian American girl and her family, and it’s clear that Ivy’s life could easily sustain a six-book series every bit as much as Julie’s did.
This is the first Best Friend book I’ve read that wasn’t written by Valerie Tripp (see Elizabeth, Nellie and Emily). And, for that matter, also wasn’t written by the Julie author, Megan McDonald. For the first time since Addy, they actually found an own-voices author to write a non-white character.
For that reason, I give this book a lot of leeway. While some elements seem cliché, perhaps that’s just Adult Me having read a fair number of stories by and about first and second generation Asian Americans. Sometimes things start to look cliché because they were true for a lot of people. And since the author herself grew up Asian American in the ‘70s, I trust that this is good representation.
Compared to Nellie and Emily, I think Ivy’s book benefits from not sharing a household with the main character – Tripp goes out of her way to keep Samantha and Molly offstage, shortchanging the friendship in the service of trying to spotlight the friend. Here, it’s well established that Ivy and Julie only see each other on weekends, so instead we’re able to get a good picture of Ivy’s large and busy family. And between gymnastics, homework, family and Chinese school, Ivy has a very busy life herself – which is what creates the main conflict here: compete in a big deal gymnastics meet, or attend a big deal family reunion. In standard AG style, Ivy finds a way to do both, also solving some secondary problems along the way.
There’s nothing the strikes me as revolutionary or unusual about this book – and like much of Julie’s series, it hardly feels like historical fiction to me, though I imagine it might to my daughter. But it’s a strong, positive portrayal of an Asian American girl and her family, and it’s clear that Ivy’s life could easily sustain a six-book series every bit as much as Julie’s did.
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