By Charise Mericle Harper
A girl loses her best friend to nothing crueler than growing up at a different pace, and sets out to find a new one.
Charise and Casey have been best friends forever, until Casey, who's two years older, starts high school and suddenly barely has time for her. Nobody did anything wrong. Things just changed, the way they do. So Charise launches a determined, sometimes comical campaign to land a brand-new best friend, navigating guinea pig allergies, an embarrassing family, and the plain ache of missing someone who's still right there. It's set in 1970s Vancouver and drawn straight from the author's own childhood.
This is a tender one for the child who's just starting to feel friendships shift under them. It's honest that losing a friend doesn't take a villain, that sometimes people just grow at different speeds, and that honesty is what makes it comforting rather than sad. The full-color panels and the funny bits, the guinea pigs and the mortifying family, keep it light on its feet, so it reads quickly and lands softly. Good for a child who's been left behind by an older friend or sibling.