Bunk 9’s Guide to Growing Up

Secrets, Tips, and Expert Advice on the Good, the Bad, and the Awkward

Adah Nuchi, Meg Hunt (Illustrator) Workman Publishing (DECEMBER) Softcover $12.95 (192pp), 978-0-7611-9359-3

The girls of Bunk 9 are fun and informative as they explain the mysteries—and debunk the myths—of growing from a girl to a woman.

Girls on the cusp of puberty will find a wealth of information and answers to top-of-mind questions in Adah Nuchi’s fresh and informative Bunk 9’s Guide to Growing Up.

Aimed at prepubescent girls, this book departs from the usual clinical format by creating a fictional collective of summer camp girls who welcome the reader to their sisterhood.

Chapter by chapter, the girls of Bunk 9 explain the mysteries—and debunk the myths— of maturing from a girl to a woman. Chapters cover physical topics like developing breasts, menstruation, and healthy eating, but social topics like friendship and boys are not left out. Because the book is aimed at the tween market, it does not cover sexual relationships or birth control. This is to its credit: it leaves room for girls to grow at their own pace, rather than rushing on to dating and serious relationships.

The narrative tone captures girls talking to girls, in a refreshing switch from textbook-like guides to teen development. Because it refuses to talk down to its audience or use euphemistic names for body parts, it’s also easy to read and absorb. Most of all, it answers questions and addresses anxieties that most adults have long since forgotten about. Can exercises and creams actually make breasts bigger? How do you use tampons? Is it normal not to have a crush on anyone?

Design and layout make this book highly appealing. Pages are ruled in blue, giving the look of a notebook, and headers and subheads in hand-lettered fonts further the look. Sidebars, dialog boxes, and thought bubbles add visual interest, and illustrations from Meg Hunt strike just the right note. The lavish use of girl-friendly colors like rose, soft lime, lavender, and yellow make the book especially appealing.

Bunk 9’s Guide to Growing Up combines an imaginative format, appealing style and color, and sound information to help girls negotiate the sometimes intimidating transition from child to young woman, and deserves high recommendations for girls and their parents. all in danger, though, as a viciously powerful presence is bent on gathering them together for uncertain ends.

Emmeline contends with her loyalty toward Dar, the delight of her newfound acceptance, and other unexpected challenges as she learns to harness and share her skills.

Connolly’s narrative is full of meaningful moral lessons, including the limits of loyalty, the importance of honesty, and the absolute necessity of trusting others. Dar proves to be a complicated companion whose demands on lonely Emmeline are increasingly costly, while those held apart because of their gifts prove to be the strongest examples of goodness and truth in the story. Acceptance, of both oneself and others, is a key and shining theme.

Chapters trip forward with light suspense, dropping foreboding occurrences along the way but also imbuing Emmeline’s story with particular charm: through the quiet of a sanctuary devoted to the comet; in the playfulness of practicing one’s skill set with a trusted friend. Settings are sketched with a light but purposeful hand, and penultimate developments open a hopeful door to future series installments.

Drawing meaning from the spaces between one girl’s own light and darkness, Shadow Weaver initiates an enchanting new juvenile fantasy series.